She has the voice of authority. He tells you what to do without being in the slightest bit aware of the real situation around you. The voice grows on you, and becomes engrained friend you trust.
The sat nav voice is carefully constructed to be calm and believable. The Media Equation suggests that we happily suspend our understanding of technology’s limits and treat it like a person. A person we are willing to listen to and a person that we trust.
Sat nav at best can be said to have partial information that has no second to second live updating. Instructions to take turns happen in real time and more & more we will see people driving in to one another because sat nav told them to.
boggartblog said
Voice of authority my arse. When I’ve travelled in a car with Sat Nav in charge she reminded me of my Mother in Law.
Once when I was doing a little wiring job for he she stood over me. “Do you know what you’re doing? Is it safe, I don’t trust electricity? Are you sure you know what you’re doing? I can get someone in if you’re not sure?” This despite her knowing I worked with high voltage electrical kit.
Miss Sat Nav is very similar. Some disasters are descibed by Cleo Hart in Are We Nearly There Yet