{"id":2641,"date":"2011-02-02T00:01:48","date_gmt":"2011-02-02T08:01:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/?p=2641"},"modified":"2011-02-01T21:29:17","modified_gmt":"2011-02-02T05:29:17","slug":"olive-dictation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/?p=2641","title":{"rendered":"Olive Dictation"},"content":{"rendered":"

There is no such thing as olive dictation<\/em>. I meant to write, “I love dictation.” Computer dictation is a handy tool, but it’s often embarrassingly inaccurate. Often hysterically inaccurate.
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\nThe dictation feature on Android phones works really well. In fact, I’m constantly surprised at how smart it it. And it’s about time.<\/p>\n

Dictation is nothing new to computers. I remember sampling some dictation software back in the early 1990s. It was slow and painful. You had to train the program to hear your voice, which meant I had to read to the PC for about three hours. Even after that (and I was seriously hoarse), dictation was spotty.<\/p>\n

Recently dictation has become more popular \u2014 and annoying.<\/p>\n

God praise whatever company has an actual human answer the phone. Most of the time you get to speak to a computer. You must dictate, “Rep-re-sen-ta-tive.” I hate that.<\/p>\n

Apple’s stupid computer support requires that you dictate your product serial number. I’ve never had that work.<\/p>\n

And why is it that you have to input your account number or a serial number, yet it’s the first thing the person asks for when you finally get ahold of someone?<\/p>\n

YouTube has a special captioning feature, one that tries to “hear” what is being said in the video. Based on the results, captions are displayed. But like anything the computer does, the technology just isn’t quite there yet.<\/p>\n

The best example of how humorous the translation feature can be is demonstrated by these two guys:<\/p>\n