Hi Bixby, Bye Bixby: How to turn off Samsung’s ‘annoying’ virtual assistant

dailystar.co.uk:

human-to-robot interactions are no longer confined to science fiction, with artificial intelligence officially becoming part of our everyday lives in the past decade.Despite still being in its primitive stage, these virtual assistants have already impressed us by demonstrating what AI can do and how it can be used to make our lives easier.We’re able to ask our virtual assistants questions like ‘what will the weather be like today?’ while deciding whether or not to pack a raincoat before heading out in the morning, or ‘what is the traffic like on the M1?’ as we decide what route to take to work.Saying that, the technology is not advanced enough yet to handle deep, philosophical questions like ‘what is the meaning of life?’ or ‘what do women really want?’Some might struggle to understand certain accents, while others might not know when to talk and when to just shut up.

Bixby, for example, often activates itself to respond to questions even when no one has used the trigger word, ‘Hi Bixby’.Twitter and Reddit are particularly flooded with complaints from angry Samsung customers who are annoyed by Bixby’s ‘terrible’ service, asking how to turn the virtual assistant off.One person said: “I just watched a test on the smartest phone assistants, Google Assistant on Android came first with a margin, then Siri on iPhone came second, Alexa for Amazon came third … Samsung's Bixby came last.

No lies, this one is kinda dumb.” Another person tweeted: “Bixby is way too annoying to have on the phone”, comparing it to the modern day equivalent of Clippy, the discontinued Microsoft Office assistant that looked like a paperclip.