What happens when the digital assistants get (really) good

Siri has been a part of Apple's iPhone since 2011. The human voice is one of the most personal and unique aspects of every individual, as well as one of the most sought after means of interacting with our devices. Voice-based interfaces have, in fact, been promised as the next big breakthrough for several decades. Until recently, though, they've been much more future promise than current reality. Even with the much heralded introduction of Apple's Siri back in October of 2011, spoken interactions with computing devices have often been more comical than helpful. Beginning with Amazon's Alexa, however--part of their Echo series of devices--the notion of natural human-style interactions with computing devices is starting to take hold.