Cobb: So Where's the Product?

December 21, 2003

So Where's the Product?

Very huge exciting news in the world of speech recognition occured several years ago when two USC professors found a solution that would be able to discern human speech from all other kinds of noise. They claimed to have solved the problem which had made all previous SR products impractical - you can't use them in noisy environments, like driving your car or walking in an airport.

So where's the product? I haven't heard anything. Have you?

Posted by mbowen at December 21, 2003 10:30 AM

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Comments

Since the device has just been invented, I'm not sure why you're asking where's the product.

But if, as the press release says, theirs is the first SR net to be sensitive to the temporal characteristics of speech, I find that a creditable reason for the claimed improvement in performance.

Posted by: Bill Benzon at December 22, 2003 08:02 PM

No no, this announcement over four years old! I'm pissed because I invested in General Magic right after the announcement. There was consolidation going on in the industry between Dragon and L&H and I think L&H were going private, so I figured that the government wanted to take over some assets before they let the tech go public. Anyway I took a bath and I don't see what anyone got out of this incredible advance.

Posted by: Cobb at December 23, 2003 01:49 AM

Whoops! My bad. Didn't see the date.

You're right . . . if this is such hot $hit there should have been product by now. Either high quality voice recognition isn't all that useful -- but what about medical transcription? -- or this advance had a damning Achilles heel.

Posted by: Bill Benzon at December 23, 2003 03:09 PM

P.S. I took a good look at the medical space back in 2001 and there wasn't any product beyond that standard IBM and Kurzweil type of VR stuff. It does make one wonder.

Posted by: Bill Benzon at December 23, 2003 03:12 PM