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Google Is Taking Spoken Questions

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on from the a-sentence-is-worth-a-thousand-search-results dept.

The New York Times is reporting that Google has added a voice interface to their iPhone search software. Expected to make its debut as early as Friday, users will be able to speak into their phone and ask any question they could type into Google's search engine. The audio will be digitized and results will be returned via the normal search interface. "Google is by no means the only company working toward more advanced speech recognition capabilities. So-called voice response technology is now routinely used in telephone answering systems and in other consumer services and products. These systems, however, often have trouble with the complexities of free-form language and usually offer only a limited range of responses to queries."

7 of 94 comments (clear)

  1. The response... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    The response to popular Slashdotter question, "where can I get laid?":

    404 - Page Not Found

  2. Good voice transcription? by argent · · Score: 4, Insightful

    If I could get good voice transcription on my computer by installing Google Desktop, THAT would make it worthwhile.

    Something for iPhone users? I could care less.

    1. Re:Good voice transcription? by YourExperiment · · Score: 5, Informative

      Something for iPhone users? I could care less.

      Really? I honestly couldn't care less, but it's nice to know someone out there is taking an interest.

    2. Re:Good voice transcription? by spydabyte · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I think you should care. Just because google decided to start with a single platform doesn't mean it'll remain that way.

      So they got rid of dealing with different platforms and stuck to a single one to focus on the algorithms behind voice recognition. Sounds like a good plan to me.
      Hopefully they'll extend it to other platforms if it works well with the iPhone.

      The iPhone seems like a more practical platform as well. It's designed for on the go and use of voice. Your desktop? Not so much.

  3. Let's just hope by rehtonAesoohC · · Score: 4, Funny

    Let's hope Google doesn't try to publicly demonstrate this like Microsoft did for Vista Speech Recognition!

    "Dear aunt, let's set so double the killer delete select all"

    Huh?!

  4. be careful telling your work phone off by jollyreaper · · Score: 4, Funny

    Be kind of awkward sitting in your manager's office explaining that you weren't surfing pr0n, just telling your phone to fuck off.

    --
    Kwisatz Haderach
    Sell the spice to CHOAM
    This Mahdi took Shaddam's Throne
  5. Voice systems are lousy ... Help, Operator... by Ron+Bennett · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Representative, Representative, Representative ... Operator, Operator, Operator ... Help, Help, Help ... (hangup in disgust)

    Hope google has better luck with this than others have.

    Ron