What is up with the iPhone auto-correct feature? A tangled web...
Any iPhone owner who sends text messages has learned with practice that the auto-correct feature, which is usually turned on by default when you get your phone, is not always your friend. After using it for awhile it supposedly gets to know you with its artificial intelligence. How cool! But aren't there some words it determines that you really wonder about?
It's fascinating for me to try to put my own mind into the computer mind of the auto-correct and imagine a tangled web of letters and words coming in, with many choices depending on the next web. It can almost be like choices we make every second in life, each based on the previous moment.
Doesn't the idea of auto-correct bring to mind a spell checker, which would imply that if you spell a word incorrectly, its built-in smarts will correct your spelling and thereby come up with a word that actually exists in the English language?
This is not always the case with the iPhone though, is it. What about words that are not even words? I'm sure you know what I'm talking about.
Also, why can't it figure out that I just forgot a space? It's great at figuring out the missing apostrophe though.
What about the suggestions? While I'm typing, I see the suggestion pop up and if I want to chose it I will. But, I don't chose it, want to keep my word I typed, see it actually typed out, and then... after [Send] it is the wrong word!
Having some fun with it... you can actually use this situation to express some bothersome activity in your brain (a.k.a. your own chaotic mind, your own tangled web of thoughts). You can just blame your outbursts on the iPhone auto-correct. "Oh sorry that was my auto-correct," you could say, and try to get away with it. Passive-aggressive behavior at its best.
Is this auto-correct actually productive? Or has it become another level of creative expression? Sometimes I have productive moments. Other times I realize I have continued to keep the feature on out of anticipation...
image "dreamz" by simeon schatz photography
© 2011 R.E.L. Copywriting
communication, creative expression, distraction, humor, intellect, productivity, technology, time management, words, writing, your mind | in copyediting | 2 Comments
Reader Comments (2)
My daughter had a great workaround today to reset (or trick) the spell-checker when it has mistakenly translated one of your typos to the wrong word. Type your desired word over and over--50 times--until it resets itself.
Love this one on the auto-correct feature http://www.digdang.com/image/she_is_pregnant/5124/