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State of Speech Synthesis and Text-To-Speech?

Posted by Cliff on from the my-computer-still-doesn't-talk-to-me dept.

Gnulix asks: "Are there any, preferably either open source products available that produce realistic speech from an arbitrary (English) text? Projects such as Festival doesn't sound all that much better than SAM (Software Automatic Mouth) did on a Commodore 64 back in 1979, nor does SoftVoice's or IBM's new products sound very good. I mean we all know that Stephen Hawking is a fun loving guy, but I bet you that he didn't choose his unrealistic, robotic voice just for the heck of it. With all the amazing advances we have seen in real-time graphics, shouldn't speech synthesis have come much, much further than what is, seemingly, available today?" Ask Slashdot last handled the Voice-To-Text issue in January of this year.

4 of 52 comments (clear)

  1. Tough One... by WeaponOfChoice · · Score: 2, Funny

    Are there any, preferably either open source products available that produce realistic speech from an arbitrary (English) text?

    If it existed it'd be in government (though the Bush model is obviously a pre alpha leak..)

    --


    It's not that I'm Anti-American - I'm Pro-Freedom
  2. Re:Hawking... by GuyMannDude · · Score: 4, Funny

    He declined, saying he and his friends had gotten used to the voice, and it was "his".

    Not to mention the legions of fans who follow his side-career as a gangsta rapper with due vigor! Changing his would give his music a very different sound!

    GMD

    --
    watch this
  3. Re:Hawking... by QuietRiot · · Score: 3, Funny

    DO check this out... Hilarious!

    They've got an MP3 relating Mr. Hawking's experience playing Grand Theft Auto 3. Quite funny. Another about his Drivebys. Find more here.

  4. Re:Actually, graphics hasn't come 'that far' by Guspaz · · Score: 5, Funny

    I just hope they have enough recordings of Majel Barrett ;-)