Voice "Portals" Let the Web Talk Back 
Speech InfoNet offers voice-activated info services through phone companies.

by David Essex, special to PC World 
January 20, 2000, 5:06 p.m. PT 

A new phone service launched this week lets you speak commands to retrieve
radio-like news, sports, business, and entertainment information. It's a hint
of things to come, as mobile phones embrace both the Web and a
safety-conscious hands-free approach.  

Speech InfoNet uses Speech Pearl 99 recognition software from Philips Speech
Processing, a division of the Dutch electronics giant. Preferred Voice makes
the server-based hardware and software to process calls and access data.
Choicecontent.com provides the content. 

Preferred Voice is running a limited demo of Speech InfoNet (call
800/390-6478 and say "operator" or "demonstration" to get instructions by
e-mail or fax). A natural-sounding voice asks you to state a category. The
content takes 8 to 12 seconds to load (according to my brief tests), and
consists of several news items read in radio broadcast style. The items are
timely and well presented, although one report on Major League Baseball was
repeated for a four-day period.  

Information from Preferred Voice is similar to the general services listed in
the front of most phone books, says Rick Stone, Preferred Voice's vice
president of sales and marketing. It's the type of material that doesn't vary
much, such as health tips, legal advice, or home maintenance ideas. Five
small phone companies have signed deals to offer the package, and two more
are testing it. Pricing will vary by phone company. 

Talk Your Way Through the Web 

Preferred Voice's Voice Integrated Platform system can also control personal
information. As a demonstration, Stone used VIP to enter my name and phone
number by dictating them to his contact database. He then placed a call to my
second line by saying my name; the phone rang within seconds. 

"We want to deliver voice recognition to your home the same way you get call
waiting," Stone says. "You could buy it from your home telephone or cell
phone company for $3 a month, for example."  

Speech Pearl 99 powers other voice-activated telephony services, says Joseph
Blankenship, a company spokesperson. Omnitel uses it for voice-activated
calling in Italy, which mandates that mobile phones be hands-free.  

"It's very, very new stuff, this idea of 'voice portals,' where you call up
and navigate a menu using your voice," Blankenship says. 

Philips chiefly competes with IBM, Nuance, and SpeechWorks in the nascent
market of voice-controlled telephony services. You'll find such services at
brokerage, telecom, and airline call centers. Several voice extensions to the
Web's Extensible Markup Language are vying for dominance, according to Megan
Gurley, research analyst at the Yankee Group. 

Speech Infonet is "a great product for the initial phases," Gurley says. But
its influence may be short-lived as more flexible forms of information
retrieval take over.  

"In six months, you'll talk to your phone, and in about a year, you'll talk
to your car," Gurley predicts. "In the next two years, you're going to be
able to talk to your house" and tell it, while you're driving home, to turn
on the porch light.  

http://www.preferredvoice.com/
http://www.speech.philips.com/