We already anthropomorphize animals enough...please leave the machines out of it.
Yes ... and yet, how much does this relate to
English as she is spoke? We don't automatically assign gender -- literal or linguistic -- (although someone referring to a ship as
he would be looked at oddly). How much does our possession of and dependence on "it" affect the way we see the world? Would a machine self-referencing as
I -- or any other pronoun -- seem odd or annoying in other languages?
I still don't know what would be used in place of "I'm printing your receipt"...WE are printing would be creepier and too imperious. Perhaps "This machine is..."
Denver is infested with "self-checkouts" whose digital voice-like synthetic generators issue no-nonsense commands to all interfacing humans.
Place the item on the scanner... Wait... Place the item in bag... Select method of payment... Insert coins before currency...
If the client unit moves too slowly or fails in any way to conform to the instruction, it is repeated ... repeated ... repeated with, I swear, increasing volume and annoyance. I have found myself responding, with gritted teeth, "But I don't
WANT a bag!" The only way to avoid having the clerk unit come over to clear the
"Place the item in the bag..." command is to
just put it in a dambag.
"Don't forget your change located next to the scanner... Don't forget to take your receipt... Please take your bag and get the hell out of the store you liberal, line-holding-up bag hata..."
Then, quickly take the item OUT OF THE BAG and stroll with deceptive, yet speedy, casualness past the clerk unit. All the while, this one's image is being digitally recorded with the ubiquitous
For Your Safety and Convenience Surveillance Cameras all the way to the street and uploaded, no doubt, to some non-bag-conformist database. The shame to my family!
-gailr
a latter-day desperado, lone holdout against an avalanche of plastic shopping bags...