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Is Speech Recognition Finally 'Good Enough'?

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the why-do-salty-snacks-keep-coming-up-freedom-fries dept.

jcatcw writes "Speech recognition software is fast, but it still may not be accurate enough. Clerical jobs usually ask for 40 wpm, but speech recognition software can keep up with someone speaking at 160 wpm. In Lamont Wood's demo it did very well at too/two/to and which/witch, but will it still render 'I really admire your analysis' as "I really admire urinalysis'? At 95% accuracy, people aren't jumping on the bandwagon. Wood's typing speed is about 60 wpm with 93% accuracy, so he found that using speech recognition was about twice as fast as typing. Those who type at hunt-and-peck speeds will experience results that are even more dramatic. There's really only one product on the US market: Dragon NaturallySpeaking from Nuance Communications. The free versions from Microsoft aren't up to the task and IBM sold ViaVoice to Nuance, where it's treated as an entry-level product."

10 of 313 comments (clear)

  1. Problems by Tribbin · · Score: 5, Insightful

    As a foreigner it is really hard to get the pronounciation right enough.

    Also command execution by others in the room is a problem.

    How about listening to music, or TV, and having the computer interpreting it.

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  2. Depends on what you use it for by orclevegam · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Is Speech Recognition Finally 'Good Enough'?

    For typing up an inter-office memo in Word, most likely. But I'm a programmer, and I can barely read out loud some perfectly fine code, I can't imagine trying to enter it all with voice recognition, no matter how good it gets.

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  3. Good enough for what? by traindirector · · Score: 4, Insightful

    TFA mentions that many people stop using speech recognition software because of poor accuracy. I don't think that's the major reason. I think they start using it because it's a neat idea that seems to have a lot of promise, but quickly realize there are only a few situations where it's actually helpful. The end of the article mentions rough drafts; I'd also say it might be a decent choice

    • when you need to enter hand-written documents into a computer
    • for transcripts of a single speaker
    • informal free-thought when not surrounded by other people
    • when you have horrible typing skills

    For the majority of office tasks, it just isn't a good fit.

    So if the "good enough" is being useful in any way whatsoever, it sounds like we're almost there.

    1. Re:Good enough for what? by L.+VeGas · · Score: 3, Insightful

      These are some good points. I don't know what I would use speech recognition for, and I'm someone that writes a lot.

      Seeing words laid out as text helps me think. I can compose things better, more coherently.

      I'll write an email in an instant, but make me leave a voice mail, and I'll usually hang up first.

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    2. Re:Good enough for what? by nine-times · · Score: 3, Insightful

      informal free-thought when not surrounded by other people

      I think you're implying something here that is one of the major reasons people don't use speech recognition software: if anyone is around, you feel like a total moron.

      You might not realize this, but you probably speak differently than you write. Most of us do, because there are some things that look good in text that sound bad spoken, and vice versa. Also, a lot of composition goes on when writing, and so if you're playing with different word choices so you can see them written out, you just end up sputtering dumb little phrases. It's easier to edit on-the-fly when using a keyboard. And let's not forget that you might not want the people around you to know what you're writing.

  4. Maybe the question should be... by Mahjub+Sa'aden · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Instead of asking if speech recognition is "good enough", maybe we should be asking whether or not it's actually useful for anything in the first place. I mean, is it good enough... to do what?

    Can you imagine being in a cubicle farm full of people talking to their computers? Or trying to talk to your computer on the bus? You have to imagine that as computers become more ubiquitous, input methods will have to adjust alongside, and I simply can't see (or hear) speech recognition doing that very well.

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    1. Re:Maybe the question should be... by babblefrog · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Where I see it coming into its own is as an input method for really portable "wearable computing", where it would be extremely inconvenient to use a keyboard.

  5. Mod parent up! by Doctor+Memory · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Seriously, the only things speech recognition is good for are bulk text entry and simple navigation. I imagine trying to use voice commands to operate modern software would be similar to letting my four-year-old help make pancakes — yes, it gets done, but it's so much easier and faster to just do it yourself. Imagine trying to edit a document using just voice commands. Is your WP going to be smart enough you can tell it "find all occurrences of 'scum-sucking bottom feeders' and replace it with 'esteemed colleagues'". Or are you going to have to say "Find. Scum hyphen sucking bottom feeders. Tab. Esteemed colleagues. Replace all." Face it, GUIs have rendered speech recognition for command and navigation moot. Most operations you perform don't have a verbal description, or at least not one that is quicker to say than to do.

    I also can't imagine it'd be that useful for actually writing things. I don't think I'm the only one who revises as they write. I think I actually write better when I write things out by hand, because it's slower so I tend to think my phrasing and sentence structure through more before I commit anything to paper. If I could suddenly type two or three times faster, I think it'd probably make my text even more incomprehensible than it usually is...

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  6. Re:Hmmm.... by bearinboots · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Dragon is no more... and hasn't been for a long time.

    NaturallySpeaking has been sold a few times to various companies.

    (I keep track because I worked on V1.0)

  7. Re:Hmmm.... by pluther · · Score: 3, Insightful

    but what if I really said "urinalysis"?

    Then your secretary would probably get it wrong too

    No, your secretary would almost certainly get it right. Your secretary would know, from experience with you and the kind of work you do and the overall context of the letter whether the person you are dictating the letter to has recently analyzed something for you, or if you are applying for a job in a medical lab.

    95% sounds good if you're not comparing it to a person. But 5% error rate is horrendous for business use. A secretary who missed one word out of every 20 would be fired after a few hours. A couple decades ago, when I temped for office work, I could transcribe about 80 wpm with close to 100% accuracy, and I was nowhere near the fastest.

    If you got a letter from a business containing a typo on almost every line, would you do business with them?

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