Forget “Jesus is My Co-Pilot.” How About Homer Simpson Instead?

TomTom offers a new Homer Simpson voice skin.

With a GPS in the car, you’re never lost. Or, so they say – until the little device encounters an address it’s never heard of or it tries taking you down a street that doesn’t exist anymore.

The occasional misdirect isn’t really the most annoying part of owning a GPS device, though. It’s the monobot “human” voices that call out your turn-by-turn directions. For some reason, the technology for recording a REAL human voice is just far beyond the capabilities of science and technology.

On my Garmin, you get your choice of either a male or female voice, in a number of accents and languages. Sadly, the Americans – Jack and Jill – are so ridiculously inhuman that I’ve resorted to letting Lee, the Australian, guide me around town.

In an effort to rectify these poor voices, TomTom is offering new, downloadable voice skins. The newest of which comes straight out of Springfield USA – Homer Simpson.

Unlike the real-world voices, the skin (voiced by The Simpsons’ Dan Castellaneta) actually sounds just like Homer – at least in the demos available on TomTom’s website. For added fun, Homer interjects some of his classic catchphrases. I’m guessing one of them isn’t, “If I don’t see it, it’s not illegal” – a phrase the fat dad shouts out in one episode, right before covering his eyes and careening through a red light.

The skin can be downloaded at TomTom’s site for $12.95, which seems a little pricey for something you’ll use once before it gets old. By that time, hopefully TomTom will have gotten my letter about other voices I’d like to hear in my car:

Christopher Walken
Pirate
William Shatner
Naked Salma Hayek
Drunk Irishman