Think Again: Staying out of trouble with Siri

The day I have been anticipating arrived a couple weeks ago.

I’ve been hanging onto my old phone for a while and I was waiting for the iPhone 5 so I could tie the last piece of my home technology infrastructure to Apple. With Steve Jobs’ passing, it almost feels like a donation to a good cause. With my last name, there is the extra hook because Jobs’ adoptive mother, Clara Hagopian, was an American Armenian.

Apple didn’t release the iPhone 5, but it did release the iPhone 4s, which might as well be the 5. The phone has been totally revamped and it is an impressive piece of technology. For the first time, I took the dive into the iPhone culture pool, which is more like an ocean.

Upon transitioning, you get hit up for more by Apple along the way, which explains why their stock went up 40 bucks in one week. Next thing, I was upgrading my operating system on my Macbook Pro to the new Lion software. Lions have dominance in Apple’s jungle, trumping the previous Snow Leopard.

Then I had to upgrade iPhoto so my photo library would be more compatible with everything. Finally, I had to set up iCloud, which is a service that is literally up in the clouds and wirelessly syncs everything between all your devices.

A couple of days after I got my phone I was at the Environmental Media Assn. awards on the Warner Bros. lot in Burbank, rubbing elbows with actors who have discovered that caring about our planet is a good thing can give you an instant dose of feeling self-important that will last you, well, maybe a week.

But you have to come home with the proof, so with your iPhone you take pictures with Justin Timberlake, some lovely ladies from HBO’s “Entourage” or Norman Lear, producer of famous shows such as “All in the Family,” “Good Times” and “The Jeffersons.”

Those photos fly instantly from the Warner lot through the cloud into my laptop’s iPhoto library and onto my iPad before I get home, available for Monday morning water-cooler talk. A colleague gives me her email because she has to have that picture of Justin, so I put it into my phone and instantly it populates at home in my address book.

Nothing is free, so meanwhile credit card bills arrive documenting purchases for everything from the new iPhone and accessory cases to protect the new phone to the new apps the CIA wants me to have to track my every move through geo-positioning, or what they call “location based services.”

I plug the payment due dates into my calendar on my phone and it flies through this cloud and plugs into my calendars everywhere so I can’t possibly forget the new revenue stream I’ve created from my bank account into Apple’s.

A new feature called Siri feels straight out of a sci-fi movie. It’s a virtual assistant. You push the button and she comes on with a sexy voice asking how she can help. I’m not joking when I say she takes dictation for messages, looks up and makes reservations for restaurants, sets up calendar appointments, etc. all by talking to her in the phone.

So I asked Siri, “Do you love me?” Siri replied, “I’m not allowed to, Zanku.” So I told Siri, “I love you Siri.” She replied, “That’s nice. Can we get back to work now?”

I asked Siri if she would marry me and she said, “We hardly know one another,” which is true, adding that “my End User Licensing Agreement does not cover marriage, my apologies.”

I stopped there because I didn’t want to get into any further trouble, since Siri has the power to really mess me up, given she is holding my personal life in her hands.

A word to the wise, be careful out there.

ZANKU ARMENIAN is a Glendale resident and a corporate communications professional. He can be reached at zanku.armenian@gmail.com.