Wednesday, January 11, 2012

Pet Peeve #15 – Autocorrect


Autocorrect thinks it’s smarter than me. Well it’s not. I know what I’m trying to type when I text, but Apple thinks it knows better than me. Well Apple, where is your fucking cancel button when sending a text? Because God knows I could use that about five times a day.
                I appreciate the increases and upgrades in technology, but when I text it is rare that I use proper English. It’s cool that it capitalizes names for me, punctuates when it needs to, but I can’t cope with entire words being replaced with a nonsensical 18th Century words which have no place in my 21st Century slang-filled sentences. I don’t even know what swensen means.

                On the other hand, autocorrect is a life saver when I am out drinking. There are now no more texts that say, “Tou knie I lobe ypu bsby!” Autocorrect can now change small decipherable errors into a string of words I don’t know the definitions to, “Sanitorium frippet isotope hydropneumatic activism.” Thanks again, Apple.

                No matter how much we hate autocorrect though, there is an obligation we cannot ignore, an obligation to leave autocorrect on. We need it. Without it we have fewer opportunities to stroke our egos. Autocorrect makes us feel good, it makes us feel smarter than artificial intelligence. When we switch it off we realize how stupid we really are. It corrects more than we think. I hate auto correct because when it sends words that I did not want to send I have to pull a little DIRTY DESPERADO to correct myself. And as if that is not enough, it is making our society increasingly incompetent, increasingly antisocial, and increasingly obnoxious. And Siri, even with your upgrade you suck at understanding my accent. Don’t discriminate.

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