Bill Gates

People will be able to control televisions, PCs and other information devices by speaking to them.

“Eventually we’ll also be able to speak to televisions, personal computers, or other information appliances.”

Said on

24 November 1995 · Book: The Road Ahead (1995)

Source

The New Swiss Army Knife: Bill Gates Predicts the iPhone in 1995 · The Marginalian (quoting The Road Ahead)

Should come true

No date given

How sure they sounded

"Eventually"

Categories

Technology

Importance

3 of 5 · Mainstream voice interfaces changed consumer electronics and computing.

Outcome

Accurate Happened 1 June 1997.

Inferred window: "eventually" taken as about 10 years from 1995. Voice control of PCs arrived within it (Dragon NaturallySpeaking in 1997, Windows speech recognition by 2006). Voice assistants (Siri 2011, Alexa 2014) and voice TV remotes later made speaking to devices routine.

Evidence:

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragon_NaturallySpeaking
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siri