Joe

Speech-to-text comes to BlackBerry

Posted by Joe on February 25, 2008 | 5 comments | Filed under : New Developments

This is a U.K.-only development for the time being, but if it ends up working there, we could see it in the U.S. Well, we already have seen it in the U.S., but it’s just a wee more expensive…and primitive. The service in the U.K., Spinvox, is offering a plugin for BlackBerrys that will convert voice mails into text. They’ve been honing D2, the conversion program, for years now, feeding it both natural language and slang. They’re even asking users to submit words and phrases that might not show up with D2 yet. Given the ultra-convenient nature of this service, it’s easy to see it catching on very soon.


As with Alltel, you have to select your package. You get 10 messages per month for 3 pounds ($6), 20 messages for 5 pounds, and 50 messages for 10 pounds. This can be charged to your debit or credit card, or to your mobile phone bill (except for the 50-message plan). By having a recurring billing system, you can go over your messages one month and dip into the next month’s supply, so you don’t run out.

Now, you can gander at this article if you wish. It’s how I was tipped off to this service. The claim here is that the BlackBerry plugin will be available for 5 pounds per year. I find this kind of hard to believe, considering the monthly prices just mentioned. There is a BlackBerry plugin option on their rates page, but no mention of the price.

Even at the equivalent of $20 per month, this could be an invaluable resource for people with busy business lives. If you think about it in terms of cost-per-hour, it could be a coup.

BlackBerry Accessories

1 SpinVox taking voice to text to a new level | BB Geeks November 20, 2008 at 3:13 pm

[...] that converts your voicemails to a text message and an email. Today, I’ll take a peek at SpinVox, a company that has been making a splash in the industry. I caught up with them at CTIA, and then [...]

2 berry_geek October 8, 2008 at 2:42 am

Doesn’t MyCaption offer it for cheaper rates now?

3 BBGeekcast update from CTIA number 2 | BB Geeks April 1, 2008 at 7:41 pm

[...] should drive down costs. There will be more of this in the future. There’s also an update on SpinVox, the speech-to-text application we talked about a few weeks ago, and Slingbox, which is planning [...]

4 Telus launches visual voicemail service | Prepaid Reviews March 7, 2008 at 8:34 am

[...] to the the feed.A company called SpinVox has been making the news lately, as they are offering a voice-to-text plugin for the BlackBerry. Now they’re partnering with Telus for a similar service, whereby smartphone users can have [...]

5 BBGeekcast: February 29, 2008 | BB Geeks February 29, 2008 at 4:14 pm

[...] Spinvox speech to text application. It’s all about convenience and efficiency. In here, I mention Tim Ferriss. You can check out [...]

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