Talk ... Without Speaking

mjm7 writes "Finally, we might be able to get rid of all those annoying people yelling over the static on their cell phones! CNN has an article about a new technology that senses muscle movements in your face and then translates them into sound. This way all you have to do is mouth words into the phone...not actually speak!" Somehow I suspect that we'd lose a lot of the subtleties of communication, but it sure would be nice every time hemos calls me from the discotheque.

Comments

Hyperion

[PinkStainlessTail]

Reminds me of the subvocal systems used in this series (as well as tons of other sci-fi). We're slowly catching up to the imaginary future!

The mute and deaf

[spookysuicide]

Imagine what a world of difference this would make to the mute or to people who had lost the use of their voice due to throat cancer. It seems weird they didn't mention the applications this would have for people who have lost or have never had the use of their voice.

injured vocal chords

[CmdrTaco (editor)]

I realize people may think of this as a luxury, but there are many people that don't have the ability to speak. From crippling diseases to the negative effects of a lifetime of smoking, some people simply cannot use their vocal chords. I know I'd find his handy next time I'm sick with a sore throat!

I'd also have to say this should be made mandatory for all people that would otherwise force me to listen to their loud cell phone conversations.

tongue in cheek?

[cheese_wallet]

Neat idea...(I didn't anyway) it looks like all they can detect right now are vowels.

I wonder how they will work out the consonant issues. The way an S is produced is pretty similar to a Z. At least they are pretty similar in my mouth anyway.

I suspect everyone produces consonants in a slightly different manner. I mean, when you are learning to speak, you don't stick your hand in someone else's mouth to figure out what their tongue is doing... You just maneuver your own until you make a similar sound.

So there are probably several different tongue configurations that work to produce a sound. Not to mention the shape of one's mouth may require a specific and unique tongue configuration to produce a particular sound as compared to someone else.

Sounds (hehe) like they have their work cut out for them in this area.

--Scott

Re:Anderson

[Mwongozi]

Mr. Smith is now office head.

Mr. Smith is now off his head.

Spot the difference. :)

Stupid....Except for

[Piper82]

To think this will end up as mass market technology is plain wrong. Can anyone really think that people will stop "speaking" into their phones? And for what, to evade cell phone static? Come on. Usage of this technology will only really take off in very niche markets where there's an actual need, like those who's speach is affected frome one form or another. Those are the people who will really benefit from this. The implications there are incredible. Now where's my Crystal Pepsi?

Pretty hard to do this in Japanese

[tibbetts]

I don't know Japanese myself, but I'm in the middle of reading The Japanese Language (no link; not carried by Amazon). One of the things that's discussed is how little mouth movement is required in Japanese, in contrast to other languages. So it's somewhat ironic that DoCoMo, a Japanese company, is leading the charge in this field.

Even in non-Japanese languages, guttural sounds like 'g', 'k', and German 'ch' cause very little muscular change--just watch yourself in a mirror some time. The article didn't go into much detail, but it may be infinitely more useful if the sensors paid attention to tongue movements instead of cheek ones.