After delivering an address on new technology to business students, I was asked about the new wave of automatic telephone recording systems, programmed to conduct intelligent conversations with callers, based on simplified question-and-answer synthesis.
My experience of robotic communications is that they invariably bog down and end up repeating, parrot
fashion: "I didn't quite get that."
When a stalemate is reached, the recording is likely to further enrage the frustrated caller by suggesting - in the sort of patronising voice usually reserved for communicating with a 3-year-old - "let's try something different".
Sadly, many of today's bright young executives have eagerly grasped this mindless "deflective shield" communication, naively believing that recording technology is somehow superior to human contact and, of course, saves time and money.
It certainly doesn't save the caller time or money, and probably only raises blood pressure levels, as you're forced to answer a series of numb-minding questions while vainly hoping you might eventually be transferred to a human being.
