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Hi house, how are you doing? We are seeing a growing number of initiatives that aim to promote home automation using natural language voice technology rather than buttons or keyboards as the user interface.

The blogosphere is awash with views on Apple’s Siri. Some of it effusive with its praise, some reveling in its supposed shortcomings — see this post from the New York Times Bits blog for example. One thing for sure, you could be forgiven for thinking that Apple’s natural language technology that powers Siri was the only game in town.

Now that Apple’s virtual assistant, Siri, is well know to the world, users are starting to ask themselves what to do with this technology and what’s the next step.

An iPhone 4S buyer is suing Apple for supposed failings in its Siri voice-activated assistant software. The dissatisfied user claims Siri often did not understand what it was being asked to do or would respond with the wrong answer.

In litigation-happy US, these types of class-action consumer suits are common, of course, and the allegations of serious failings in the product have to be taken with a pinch of salt.

Artificial Solutions unveils software toolkit to allow developers to build platform independent intelligent, humanlike conversations into their mobile apps.

Artificial Solutions, the natural language interaction (NLI) specialist that enables users to have a meaningful, humanlike interaction with technology, announced today that it will be unveiling Teneo Toolkit at Mobile World Congress (MWC). With Gartner already predicting that voice will be a disruptive technology to watch in 2012, the Teneo Toolkit will allow developers to easily include Artificial Solutions’ patented technology and enable their mobile apps, software programs or devices think, reason and converse in an intelligent, humanlike manner, regardless of platform, device or language.

First IBM’s Watson beat Jeopardy champions Ken Jennings and Brad Rutter. Then Apple captivated mobile consumers with the iPhone 4S, which included an enhanced version of Siri, the voice-driven assistant born at Menlo Park, CA-based SRI International. Suddenly, the idea that computers might be just as good as humans at carrying out certain types of requests seemed a lot less far-fetched.

For companies trying to win corporate and consumer adoption of their own NLP technologies, this is a long-awaited moment. And one of the firms that thinks 2012 could be the year this market really takes off is VirtuOz VirtuOz, Inc., a Paris-born company that moved its headquarters to Emeryville, CA, in 2009.

VirtuOz, Inc., the leading provider of intelligent virtual agents (IVAs) for online marketing, sales, and support, today announced that it processed a record 166 million conversations in 2011 on behalf of its customers.  This growth was fueled, in part, by expansion of VirtuOz’ client base across multiple verticals including high tech, telecommunications, retail, and consumer packaged goods.  In addition, the company noted the expansion of IVA usage from customer service, to sales and marketing via a growing number of touch points, including mobile phones and social media, such as Facebook.

Mobile devices are playing an increasing role in the lives of millions of people across the world, across all generations. As more and more online technologies deploy into the mobile realm, Virtual Agent technology is following this trend. Apple’s implementation of Siri, the voice-to-text virtual assistant feature they have added to the iPhone 4S, opened the world’s eyes to mobile virtual agent technology. Android also has added Vlingo, a similar feature that combines voice-to-text and voice recognition technology with its powerful “intent engine” to help users complete their desired action.

In a recent release Gartner predicted its top ten disruptive technologies for 2012. Amongst the expected and rather predictable media tablets, app stores and cloud computing, Gartner says that icons, menus and pointers will be replaced by mobile-centric interfaces such as gesture, voice and search. But voice isn’t everything. For it to be a successful method of interaction, voice needs an underlying intelligence.

The day when artificial intelligence (AI) reaches the stage of self-awareness is “lifetimes” away, the innovation officer at MyCyberTwin has claimed.

Speaking to Computerworld Australia about the possibility of intelligent machines roaming the earth, MyCyberTwin’s chief innovation officer and co-founder, John Zakos, said such a leap in technology may take lifetimes.