I suspect that a big driver behind speech and handwriting recognition was simply that 15-20 years ago there were a lot of adults in their 40's who had never learned how to type, much less use a mouse. I would rather click on a column and sum, but that's because I grew up learning how to do this quickly and accurately. White collar professionals at the peak of their careers in the late 80's were often told that typing was a skill for secretaries and that all they had to do was give dictation. The secretary would do the "speech recognition".