|
|
TVs that answer back....
+01: UK's First Inbuilt Text-To-Speech TVs Hit The Shelves.
Electronics manufacturer Panasonic has built text-to-speech functionality into 30 of its television models, designed specifically to help blind and visually impaired users, making them the first such TVs to become available on the UK general market. After switching on the function during installation, text-to- speech will be present over a wide range of tasks in the televisions, including speaking the channel number and name of a programme when switching channels; the time that a programme begins and ends; and whether other accessibility features such as audio description are available for a programme. Text-to-speech assistance is provided on connecting to a Wi-Fi network through the TV, and users can also to scroll through a TV's electronic programme guide and listen to the list of programmes, timing information and a synopsis of each programme. Speaking to E-Access Bulletin, Nigel Prankard, IPTV and digital TV solutions centre manager at Panasonic, said a lower implementation cost of text-to-speech in recent times had enabled the company to offer the functionality. "If you asked us to introduce text-to-speech [into our televisions] two years ago, the extra cost would have been significant, but with the onset of activity in the IT world, the implementation costs of text-to-speech have come down, enabling us to put it into the TVs without passing on the cost to customers", Prankard said. Panasonic worked with the Royal National Institute of Blind People to build the text-to-speech function, undertaking user- testing with a prototype before gathering feedback and making improvements to the final design. Prankard said he hopes to further improve the functionality and add more features if there is positive feedback from the initial models, possibly looking at how text-to-speech could work for internet-connected TVs. "The W3C [World Wide Web Consortium] are trying to make more regulatory requirements for web accessibility, so we may have to think how TVs could handle [web accessibility requirements] if we give them the full ability to go to websites", he said. Brian -- Brian Gaff - Note:- In order to reduce spam, any email without 'Brian Gaff' in the display name may be lost. Blind user, so no pictures please! |
TVs that answer back....
On 31/03/2012 09:05, Brian Gaff wrote:
+01: UK's First Inbuilt Text-To-Speech TVs Hit The Shelves. Electronics manufacturer Panasonic has built text-to-speech functionality into 30 of its television models, I wonder how many Apple patents they had to pay for? -- Adrian C |
TVs that answer back....
Adrian C wrote:
I wonder how many Apple patents they had to pay for? Mind you, text-to-speech goes back donkey's years. I remember listening to it 20 years ago at BT's R&D place and it was really good. Already they were using a real human voice which had been processed in some way to extract the phonemes and then reconstruct the new words. And of course synthesised voices like Stephen Hawkins uses go back even further. -- SteveT |
TVs that answer back....
None, after all the goodmans box has been around for some years now, and
ththey probably bought the rights or the rights were owned by rnib. Personally I'm a bit orried by the first part of the surname of the Panasonic bloke. It is after all nearly April 1. Hope its true though Brian -- Brian Gaff - Note:- In order to reduce spam, any email without 'Brian Gaff' in the display name may be lost. Blind user, so no pictures please! "Adrian C" wrote in message ... On 31/03/2012 09:05, Brian Gaff wrote: +01: UK's First Inbuilt Text-To-Speech TVs Hit The Shelves. Electronics manufacturer Panasonic has built text-to-speech functionality into 30 of its television models, I wonder how many Apple patents they had to pay for? -- Adrian C |
TVs that answer back....
Yes, Back in the 80s I had an add on for the ZX Spectrum which spoke.
This is what makes it all so ridiculous that it is not an option on all devices. It would be particularly useful on washing machines I feel. The current crop are totally unusable by anyone with eyesight problems Of course talking Videos and clock radios were made by Sharp in the 80s, but never caught on as the voices were rather naff and sounded like lecturers whos first language was Japanese. Many talking watches now are around in places like Argos as well. Incidentally, the male voice in that daft apple advert is actually called Daniel and was used for some years as the voice of engineering announcements on London Underground. I have him on my pc. Brian -- Brian Gaff - Note:- In order to reduce spam, any email without 'Brian Gaff' in the display name may be lost. Blind user, so no pictures please! "Steve Thackery" wrote in message ... Adrian C wrote: I wonder how many Apple patents they had to pay for? Mind you, text-to-speech goes back donkey's years. I remember listening to it 20 years ago at BT's R&D place and it was really good. Already they were using a real human voice which had been processed in some way to extract the phonemes and then reconstruct the new words. And of course synthesised voices like Stephen Hawkins uses go back even further. -- SteveT |
TVs that answer back....
Brian Gaff wrote:
It is after all nearly April 1. True, but the description is very credible, and utterly uncontroversial. As I said, text-to-speech is an ancient technology and well sorted. Technically it would be trivial to apply it to a TV - it's presumably just the need to shave every cent of the costs that they haven't done it years ago. (Also, presumably, because there was no real demand for it.) -- SteveT |
TVs that answer back....
On Sat, 31 Mar 2012 09:26:01 +0100, Adrian C
wrote: On 31/03/2012 09:05, Brian Gaff wrote: +01: UK's First Inbuilt Text-To-Speech TVs Hit The Shelves. Electronics manufacturer Panasonic has built text-to-speech functionality into 30 of its television models, I wonder how many Apple patents they had to pay for? Text to speech predates Apple by decades. I had a text to speech program on paper tape that ran on a Leo 3 in 1970. I've no idea who wrote it. Steve -- Neural Network Software. http://www.npsl1.com EasyNN-plus. Neural Networks plus. http://www.easynn.com SwingNN. Forecast with Neural Networks. http://www.swingnn.com JustNN. Just Neural Networks. http://www.justnn.com |
TVs that answer back....
Yes if you want to hear it, listen to BBC In Touch for Tuesday on I player.
The voice is I think called Serena. Brian -- Brian Gaff - Note:- In order to reduce spam, any email without 'Brian Gaff' in the display name may be lost. Blind user, so no pictures please! "Steve Thackery" wrote in message ... Brian Gaff wrote: It is after all nearly April 1. True, but the description is very credible, and utterly uncontroversial. As I said, text-to-speech is an ancient technology and well sorted. Technically it would be trivial to apply it to a TV - it's presumably just the need to shave every cent of the costs that they haven't done it years ago. (Also, presumably, because there was no real demand for it.) -- SteveT |
TVs that answer back....
no real demand for it.)
But with ageing populations in so many countries there may now be a demand for it which will grow and grow - to be followed perhaps by demand for: (i) voice recognition so eg I don't have to try to diagnose over the phone why there's no sound from the TV, there's no signal etc etc (all - so far - mistakes with the remotes); and then (ii) simple AI software so the TV will respond back when I shout at it and agree that the BBC is a biased........ :) -- Robin reply to address is (meant to be) valid |
TVs that answer back....
In article ,
Stephen Wolstenholme wrote: I wonder how many Apple patents they had to pay for? Text to speech predates Apple by decades. I had a text to speech program on paper tape that ran on a Leo 3 in 1970. I've no idea who wrote it. Apple has recently obtained a number of TTS patents. These probably relate to improvements in the naturalness of speech and use on mobile devices. They don't have any control over TTS in general. Even if Panasonic have licensed patents for this, most of them are probably not from Apple. -- Richard |
TVs that answer back....
On 31/03/2012 9:26 AM, Adrian C wrote:
On 31/03/2012 09:05, Brian Gaff wrote: +01: UK's First Inbuilt Text-To-Speech TVs Hit The Shelves. Electronics manufacturer Panasonic has built text-to-speech functionality into 30 of its television models, I wonder how many Apple patents they had to pay for? text to speech has been around forever - even on the zx spectrum you could fit a currah speech. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lq_pYiXh9zw -- Gareth. That fly.... Is your magic wand. |
TVs that answer back....
On 31/03/2012 10:29 AM, Brian Gaff wrote:
Chuckle, a bit like that so called inteligent interface for Iphones on adverts at the moment. The voice on that is from the same stable as the one Panasonic are using. I wonder if any of the sets with inbuilt freesat have the voice.that would be the only game in town if they have. Brian i always think that voice sounds like alan deadicoat -- Gareth. That fly.... Is your magic wand. |
TVs that answer back....
On 31/03/2012 09:46, Brian Gaff wrote:
None, after all the goodmans box has been around for some years now, and ththey probably bought the rights or the rights were owned by rnib. Personally I'm a bit orried by the first part of the surname of the Panasonic bloke. It is after all nearly April 1. Hope its true though He seems to be a real person http://uk.linkedin.com/pub/nigel-prankard/13/41b/b0 -- Phil Cook |
TVs that answer back....
On 31/03/2012 09:46, Brian Gaff wrote:
Personally I'm a bit orried by the first part of the surname of the Panasonic bloke. It is after all nearly April 1. He seems to be genuine. This link http://www.dvb.org/groups_modules/commercial_module/cm3dtv/index.xml says he is secretary of the CM-3DTV group within the DVB consortium. Andy |
| All times are GMT +1. The time now is 09:14 PM. |
Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.6.4
Copyright ©2000 - 2021, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.
HomeCinemaBanter.com