Playing an important role in the future of smartphones will be voice assistants, to the point of changing how we use the device. A future where you turn on the phone and simply speak to a voice assistant like Siri and Gemini for everything is not far away. It also means we will type less and indirectly, we will write even less.
“Voice-centric UI is important. It is not about foldables… it is not a form factor issue. As AI develops, and we move more towards this kind of voice-centric UI and let’s say app-less UI, then whether it’s bar bar-type or a foldable-type phone, I think this is a possibility. Right now, for foldables, which have a larger screen, we have gone with the app interface, but as AI develops, and we receive more customer feedback, such options can be explored,” Sally Hyesoon Jeong, executive vice-president, head of framework R&D, mobile experience business, Samsung Electronics, recently told The Telegraph.
Like the death of books, educators have been talking about the end of handwriting for years. Both are alive and not on medication. But it is true that our reliance on paper notes, wall calendars and Post-it reminders has reduced drastically. Many schools around India, once the junior classes are over, require much of the classwork and homework to be done digitally. What’s more, AI is making us think less, so forget about jotting down something.
There is an issue that US public schools still teach children handwriting, so the art is not fading away. But there is also criticism: The Common Core State Standards in the US don’t require teaching students to write in cursive. Some states, like California and Louisiana, have added cursive to the standards but not all. Typing and voice take precedence in our lives because voice makes every device interaction at least three times faster than we can type (on a keyboard) and at least five times faster than we can text (on a smartphone), according to Tobias Dengel, president at WillowTree, a TELUS International Company. It’s not just the US that’s putting emphasis on digital learning.
Finland removed cursive writing from its schools in 2016, and Switzerland reduced instruction in cursive handwriting. Even adults are using pen and paper less than before, even to note down a grocery list. Earlier, music fans used to queue outside the exit of stadiums to catch a glimpse of their heroes and maybe get a few records autographed. Now, it’s about requesting a selfie. Many cheques are bouncing because signatures don’t match since we hardly issue this mode of banking instructions anymore.
But all is not lost
In the last few years, there has been an emphasis on STEM education. When it comes to math or science problems, teachers and students need to jot down problems; scientists need to take notes in the lab. These things can be done digitally, but they still require base-level communication skills.
Life without handwriting
Our handwriting skills have deteriorated over the years and we don’t notice it until we need to write something on a form. Besides teachers, few people emphasize the importance of handwriting in everyday life. It’s an exercise that improves cognitive skills.
Our fingers are an advanced tool, if you want to call it that. Writing by hand offers clarity. It requires dexterity in the hands and fingers as well as the forearms.
Given the rise of AI bots, soon handwriting may become one of the few tools students can use to prove they’re not a bot.
Two psychologists, Pam A. Mueller of Princeton and Daniel M. Oppenheimer of the University of California, Los Angeles, have found that students learn better when they take notes by hand than when they type on a keyboard. Writing allows students to process a lecture’s contents and reframe them for better understanding. For decades, tech companies have been pushing the stylus for taking down notes. It’s helpful, but it can’t replace handwriting.
Yet as we now move into the AI era, the stylus on the phone is almost dead. Take the latest Samsung Galaxy Z Fold7: It no longer supports the S Pen. But the S Pen and Apple Pencil are still around when it comes to tablets. Once again, those have become better tools for drawing than taking down notes.