Apple Computer and Speech
Many of us at Microsoft are big fans of Apple Computer. I saved up my paper route money in high school to buy an Apple II, I was the first in my dorm to own a Mac. I even worked there for six years, and that's not counting the time I spent as a writer for MacWorld and a big-time diehard Apple user in grad school. You'll never get me to say anything bad about Apple.
I presented at many a World Wide Developer Conference back in the 90s when it was held each year in May at the San Jose Convention Center, so I was happy this year to see Steve Jobs mention TTS in his speech there yesterday (the video link is here: skip ahead to 55 minutes into the presentation if you just want to see the TTS stuff).
But he got a few things wrong. First, notice how he's not even using the real Vista voice. Yes, it's our voice ("Anna") but he's playing it back as an audio file. Why not run it directly from Vista?
Second, he picks on us for not knowing how to pronounce the various Apple products. Something like "iPod" is by now mainstream enough that we should have it in there (and it will be, in our new voice), but how would you pronounce "OS X"? Is it "10" or is it "ex"?
Next, he implies that the Mac voice is better because it can play back at high speed. We do that too, of course. (type "text to speech voice speed" in the Help button).
