Tag: voice recognition

AT&T’s Watson Looks for Its Voice in a Crowded App Marketplace

by Brian Washburn, posted in Communicate

B. Washburn
B. Washburn

Summary Bullets:

  • AT&T Watson comes from different roots than Google’s Voice Actions or Apple’s Siri.  Its API faces mobile apps, but it could transcend them.
  • AT&T’s charge for use of Watson may turn developers away, but it can win with a premium pitch that attracts developers with business models generating actual revenues.

Just as it said it would, AT&T released its first API function tapping its Watson speech engine in June.   Starting with a one-time $99 charge (and a rate of about $0.01 per transaction starting in 2013), developers can access and incorporate the network-based voice recognition service into their apps.  There is just one function call currently available: speech-to-text.  However, speech-to-text is how successful voice recognition applications such as Apple’s Siri, Samsung’s S Voice, and Nuance Communications’ Vlingo mobile app all work (and by no coincidence, Vlingo is a Watson licensee).  Voice dictation, when captured and interpreted accurately, can transcribe and send SMS, launch Web searches and directory searches, or search through specific documentation or help pages, such as a software manual. Continue reading “AT&T’s Watson Looks for Its Voice in a Crowded App Marketplace” →

Unusual Suspects Set to Move the Collaboration Space in 2012

by Brad Shimmin, posted in Communicate
B. Shimmin
B. Shimmin

Summary Bullets

  • The human-centricity of collaboration software invites innovation driven from many disparate industries and technologies.
  • Natural interface design, information foraging techniques and game theory are set to change the collaboration landscape in 2012.

There are few certainties in this world. And yet, as if bound by a cosmological force greater than the pull of gravity itself, at this time every year, those of us in the technology industry feel an unshakable pull, an unrelenting need to prognosticate. I am in no way immune to such innate stipulations, so it is with great pleasure that I bring to you my own forecast for 2012’s enterprise collaboration platform marketplace. But, just to keep things interesting, what follows are the three most unusual yet profoundly influential trends I think we are likely to see play out this coming year. Continue reading “Unusual Suspects Set to Move the Collaboration Space in 2012” →