I only started relying on using my phone’s microphone for Google searches and giving commands like playing a certain radio station or podcast a few months ago, and it’s only been a few weeks since I’ve discovered the ease of writing and responding to text messages using only the microphone. But I’m hooked. So much so, that now, when I take out my laptop and want to look something up and view the results and navigate on a bigger screen, typing seems like a chore.
This is a pretty big shift. I am a fairly fast typist, and used to love being able to look something up or type in a web address, what I thought was quickly, using my laptop keyboard. Now, though, I am questioning whether typing might soon become an antiquated skill. I had been thinking it was something I should try to get June to learn (introducing her to typing games and hoping that she would become interested in them on her own), but now I’m not sure the ability will be that necessary or relevant. She has already mastered looking up animal facts and cat embroidery images using voice commands on my phone, and she can send texts with stickers and GIFs without a problem. Why should she be motivated to get her fingers to clack along strangely-arranged keys in an orchestrated way, if even her old mom is now tired by the relative sluggishness of that method of text input?