Random Accesses

According to Microsoft this week, "voice is the new touch." Never mind that we've been hearing the "voice recognition will change the world" mantra for more than a decade now; this time, it's the real deal! And the company might be right, thanks in part to the peculiar power of the cloud.

With the launch of Windows 7, Microsoft is again talking up its voice recognition efforts, which extend from operating systems to cars to mobile phones. The company has certainly been hammering away at the technology for quite some time; limited versions have been included in Office for years, and a full speech recognition package was built into Vista. Bill Gates has also been predicting the rise of voice communication for a decade.

But Microsoft does have something important: a crack speech-recognition team with access to cloud-based voice recognition servers. It acquired TellMe in 2007, and the Speech at Microsoft group now controls the TellMe voice platform, which manages more than six million calls per month.

Source: http://arstechnica.com/microsoft/news/2009/10/voice-recognition-gets-cloudy-will-soon-rival-humans.ars