There’s a rise in the use of voice recognition and talking computers. This article charts the perils of getting into conversation with one of these machines.

Apparently big companies are spendiing a lot of money in order to perfect the gender and tone of the voice.

Certain research has shown that female voices are less persuasive than male ones.

An example of this can be found in Japan, where a stockbroking company used a female voice on its machine to give information on stocks and shares but then a male one to make the actual sale.

In America, a female-voiced satellite navigation system directs drivers; the same system had to be discontinued in Germany because male drivers refused to be directed by a ‘woman’.

One of the Canadian telephone companies published a biography of the imaginary woman its machine was imitating. She was Emily, a nice small-town girl who had a history degree and went backpacking round Asia after college.

With some panache, a local radio host decided to call her up.

Emily, of course, being a machine could only answer his chat with lines like: “You’re calling to check your account balance. Is that right?”

The main advantage for companies is that these machines are cheap and don’t have workers rights. Will it soon be difficult to tell whether we’re talking to a human being or a machine on the other end of the line?