My Speech-Brother Eric B. and I were enjoying a leisurely brunch here at The Home Office–reading the newspaper, sipping mimosas and eating our traditional Speech Tech Breakfast of poached eggs, kippers, rashers, fried bread and Jell-O–when we came across a story on the cover of The New York Times about speech technology.
Check out the above link, to read all the news that’s fit to print about Google Translate. We haven’t seen anything this high profile since The New Yorker Episode of 08.
Movie Critic Roger Ebert–who is recovering from a serious bout with thyroid cancer that rendered him speechless–has been using TTS to communicate. However, Ebert’s TTS recently got a new voice–his own. His new voice by CereProc is programmed from collected audio clips and snippets from the movie critic’s many television appearances and DVD commentaries.
According to an official press release, “GM Voices, the world’s largest producer of professionally-recorded voice for telephony applications, hit the recording studio (down the hall) and turned Asterisk open source inspiration into a rocking tribute to IVR, complete with jamming guitars, bangin’ drums, a white-hot harmonica solo and the angelic vocals of the “Call Center Girls,” customer service AND singing professionals.”
So, as we all count down to The Big Dance, check out Conference Chair Jim Larson dishing on some of his personal programme highlights from SpeechTEK Europe.
What are you looking forward to at SpeechTEK Europe 2010?
I believe that speech-enabled multimodal applications are the wave of the future, and so I’m particularly looking forward to Professor Wolfgang Wahlster’s Keynote presentation on research in European universities and company laboratories in the areas of speech, multimodal, and multilingual technologies so I can plan to use these new types of technologies when they become available.
In Developing Multimodal Applications, attendees will learn how to integrate web-based services to create “mashup” applications involving speech, and how to develop multimodal applications on a variety of mobile devices. I believe these approaches will be widely used to deploy speech-enabled multimodal applications that customers can use anywhere, anytime on nearly any device.
In our Panel Session: Advanced Speech Recognition Techniques and Experiences, developers will give first hand experiences about designing, implementing, and deploying call routing applications. I’m looking forward to learning from their successes as well as their mistakes in providing voice-based call routing.
The Using Voice Biometrics Session explains how to identify speakers and verify that speakers are who they claim to be. These promise to help minimise fraud and theft.
The European market place is multilingual, yet most of today’s speech applications only speak and understand a single language. SpeechTEK Europe has two Sessions on developing multilingual speech applications, how to conduct usability tests in multiple languages, and how to deal with cross-cultural attitudes about IVR and speech systems.
Other highlights for me at SpeechTEK Europe are sessions describing challenges in new IVR markets, key directions for unified communications and hosting/premise, and a panel of analysts predicting the future of speech in Europe.
It’s no secret that my Speech Brother Eric B. and I love Creepy Talking Robots. Just the other day, we were sitting around the old campfire, shelling peanuts and talking about all the Creepy Talking Robots we’ve profiled over the years: strange, vaguely sexual gynoids with feathered blond hair and trampy speech recognition engines.
And then it happened. We encountered a CTR the likes of which we thought did not–nay could not, could never–exist. Prepare, Speech-Heads, for the absolute horror and lurid nightmare that is Roxxxy.
This month, Daniel Ziv–vice president of customer interaction analytics at Verint Witness Actionable Solutions–tackles how understanding customer behavior is important regardless of the chosen communications medium in a pice titled Social Media Meets Speech Analytics.
Check It. As my Speech Brother Eric B. once said: “This one is gonna be a real barnburner.”
As all you Speech-Heads probably know, when it comes to product testing my Speech-Brother Eric B. was always the go-to-guy here at Speech Tech Blog. In his heyday, Eric B. would be testing five, six, seven speechy products every week, writing up reports, tuning, jotting down notes, talking to computers, etc.
Well, in his absence, I decided to try Ribbit Mobile. And let me just say this: Unlike a lot of speech solutions I have experienced, this one WORKS LIKE GANGBUSTERS!
I set it up on my cell phone (in a matter of minutes) logged onto the site on my computer and was good to go. My messages were transcribed almost perfectly and sent to me as a text message and as an email. And that was really just the tip of the iceberg. There were a lot of other cool features and functions and I heartily recommend the product.
Like I said, this is a Brief Summary. I have IVRs to navigate.
The questions about SpeechTEK Europe never stop around The Home Office. My Speech Brother Eric B. and I must field about 100 calls everyday:
What’s up with SpeechTEK University? What’s the deal with Conference Sessions? What do I need to know about Keynotes? What should I do with the precious moments of my one and only life? What’s poppin’ with Customer Case Studies?
It’s Webinar Time! And this one promises to be a doozy! My Speech Brother Eric B. is flying in from Prague just to get in on the action. This one is moderated by Speech Technology’s own David Myron and features the likes of Ovum’s Daniel Hong and some top industry insiders from Contact Solutions, Avaya, Nuance and CSG Interactive Messaging.
Outbound interactive Voice Response (IVR) technology is quickly becoming an effective and cost efficient method of communication and is also being combined with other contact channels as part of a multichannel customer service solution and cost containment strategy. According to an Ovum report on hosted speech and outbound IVR services, this market is scheduled to grow to $525 million by 2013 as companies shift toward a more personalized, directed method of communications with their customers.
Here is what you can learn from this informative one hour session on this technology:
How an on-going optimization program will lead to new savings
How automated, proactive customer care improves service while lowering costs
How to leverage blended, cross-channel customer interaction strategies that enhance the customer experience and secure long-term profitable customer relationships
Surprising new insight into what consumers actually think about receiving outbound notifications
Join us on January 28 as we discuss trends in this market and how these industry professionals can help you take advantage of this growing business application.
SpeechTEK Europe is right around the corner and we here at Speech Tech Blog are pleased to announce the event’s 2010 Keynote Speakers. So, check out this year’s program, register today and make note of this powerhouse lineup:
Listening to Your Customers: How Companies can Mobilise Consumers as Co-creators and Innovators
Strategist, government advisor and innovator, Charlie Leadbeater, on the phenomenon of social media creativity and the importance of customer communication and relationships.
CEO of the German Research Center for AI, and Professor of Computer Science at Saarland University, Professor Wolfgang Wahlster on the latest research findings in speech, multimodal, and multilingual technologies, and what’s about to hit the market.
Adam B. —
March 9, 2010 @ 11:32 am 
Hey Speech-Heads,
Hey Speech-Heads,
Hey Speech-Heads,
Hey Speech-Heads,
As all you Speech-Heads probably know, when it comes to product testing my Speech-Brother 
The questions about 
Hey Speech-Heads,
OK Speech-Heads,
Strategist, government advisor and innovator, Charlie Leadbeater, on the phenomenon of social media creativity and the importance of customer communication and relationships.
CEO of the German Research Center for AI, and Professor of Computer Science at Saarland University, Professor Wolfgang Wahlster on the latest research findings in speech, multimodal, and multilingual technologies, and what’s about to hit the market.