Hindsight · review build · data not yet validated

Keyboards exist, but most text is created by speaking

Ray Kurzweil, Books and essays, 1999, published 1999-01

Keyboards still exist, but most textual language is created by speaking.

Verdict

missTwo blind graders agree (D7, rule D16). The auditor agent confirmed it (D11).

Grader A: miss

Same finding as 014: in 2009 almost all text was typed. Speech recognition reached human-transcriber parity on the standard benchmark only in 2016, and smartphone voice assistants started in late 2011.

Test: Majority of text created by speech: well under 5% in 2009 and 2014.

Achieving Human Parity in Conversational Speech Recognition (Microsoft) (2016-10-17): Machine recognition first matched professional transcribers in 2016.

Grader B: miss

Speech was not the main source of text in 2009 or by 2014; dictation stayed niche.

Test: Share test: dictated text <5% by 2014.

Wikipedia: Speech recognition (accessed 2026-09-28): GOOG-411 2007; deep learning cut error rates from 2009; Siri used Nuance; Microsoft reached human parity on Switchboard only in 2017.

All captured fields

rank: 34
kind: decade_prediction
section: Education
subject: Keyboards exist, but most text is created by speaking
target year: 2009
timing: in
position: Chapter 9, "2009"; item Education 8 in Kurzweil 2010, p. 38
confidence: high
note: Wording as reproduced by the author in "How My Predictions Are Faring" (2010); book page not given there. Subject label is the essay's own item heading.