Silicon Valley is driving users to ditch keyboards and spend hours talking to their tech
Gavin McNamara has abandoned his keyboard and spends all day talking rather than typing.He speaks for hours with his computer and phone, sending emails, writing presentations, posting on LinkedIn and even coding through conversations using an AI dictation app from San Francisco startup, Wispr Flow.
The AI punctuates, formats and adapts his rambling into coherent copy.McNamara averages 125 words per minute, which is twice the average typing speed.“At this point, anything that could be done by typing, I do by speaking,” said the 32-year-old, founder of software agency Why Not Us.
“I just talk.” Across 77 apps, he has dictated nearly 300,000 words in the past five months — that’s equivalent to writing three novels.California’s tech titans and startups are at the forefront of a movement to use AI and the large language models they are based on to push people to interact with technology using their voices rather than their fingers.“AI and LLMs have changed the dynamic,” said CJ Pais, the San Diego-based creator of free voice-to-text dictation app Handy.
“Using your voice is much faster than typing.” Business A new Gallup poll finds that American workers have incorporated artificial intelligence into their work lives at a remarkable pace over the last few years.A mix of independent developers and startups, including Handy, San Fransico’s Wispr Flow and Willow and others, have sprung up to offer accurate voice interaction with artificial intelligence.The biggest names in tech are also creating new ways for people to partner with AI.
Meta’s latest smart glasses rely on voice.OpenAI and Meta have designed distinct personalities for their bots’ voice chats.
Even Amazon’s Alexa and Apple’s Siri are undergoing AI upgrades, which the companies anticipate will have everyone talking to their tech much more.These free and paid methods for using spoken words with computers have attracted millions of users, including coders, executive assistants,...