I've known people working on voice recognition software, and all indications are that it's way behind the curve. Anyone on Board have any direct knowledge of it? PM me if you'd prefer - I'm curious about its development
I don't have direct experience, f'babe, but some of my students do, and I have been helping with some research into voice recognition as well.
It has improved by leaps and bounds over the past year or so, and there are some quite sophisticated programs out there. However they still suffer from only recognising one voice (a bit like a collie dog!) and each individual user has to program the machine to suit him/herself.
But there is some exciting work being done on voice recognition for people with speech problems, especially those associated with strokes and neurological conditions such as MS and ALS(MND if you're a brit!) or some of the severer forms of CP.
The research I have been helping along is looking particularly at disarthric speech, which is very disjointed and very hard to understand, even for another human being.
If the project is successful, it will not only bring communication media to those who find it difficult, but will also bring increased knowledge to new programs which power ordinary voice recognition machines.
