July/August 2004

Magazine Features

A Measure of Success

This is an "interactive" column where you, the reader, can participate in surveying the usability of self-service systems across 10 industry categories. The idea is to provide monthly highlights on companies that score high in the Sterling Audits Usability Index. This index is a new, standard methodology for rating the usability of Web sites, voice response and automated portions of the contact center.

Beyond XML 2.0

The W3C Voice Browser Working Group reviewed more than 700 requests for change to VoiceXML 1.0. After careful deliberation, many of these were adopted, resulting in VoiceXML 2.0 which became a recommendation in March 2004. The VBWG is now working on two efforts to make VoiceXML even better.

Bueno? Are You Listening to Your Spanish Speakers

Spanish speakers are the fastest growing population in the United States. To realize the full potential of this largely untapped market, businesses must plan for the impact this will have on self-service automation; voice user interface designers need to incorporate best practices targeted for these users; and the industry as a whole should offer technology solutions and packaged applications specific to Spanish as spoken in the United States.

Technical Standards Facilitate Innovation

Rarely does a technical standard directly benefit end users. However, in the world of speech technologies they do. Standards facilitate innovation and reduction in the total cost of ownership of speech applications, but have been slow to market. Standards allow programmers to create platform-independent (and ideally vendor-independent) speech applications.

Top 10 Survival Strategies for Spanish Applications

The companion piece to ¿Bueno? Are You Listening to Your Spanish Speakers by Sondra Ahlén, Lizanne Kaiser and Eduardo Olvera.

Voice Applications: Evolving to Meet Commercial Needs

As the global economy moves out of recession, enterprises large and small will want to continue reaping the rewards that voice applications have provided in terms of return on investment and customer satisfaction. Indeed, Datamonitor estimates that global voice business will grow to more than $2 billion by 2007, a clear indication of the growth in commercial and consumer confidence relating to this technology.

Editor's Letter

Analyzing the Verticals

Forward Thinking

Crossing Species Boundaries

Not long ago I wrote a column about a Japanese researcher whose technology was used to develop Bow-Lingual, a product that was advertised as being able to translate dog barks into English. Although that product (along with its correlate for cat meows) could offer pet owners some assistance, it is primarily intended to provide fun.

Human Factor

Rolandi’s Razor

Anyone who has ever taken a philosophy course has probably heard of the medieval theologian, William of Occam, a Franciscan monk who led a troubled life. Mostly because his teachings seemed to aid and abet some theological enemies of the papacy, Occam frequently found himself at odds with the powers that be.

Industry View

The Battle for Partner Share

As the second half of 2004 unreels we will be watching a metric that is proving to be very important indeed. We call it partner share. We can define this as the amount of an ecosystem that is involved with your product. In the case of speech, this could include system integrators, related software including CTI or digital recording, as well as independent software vendors of CRM and B2E applications.

Q & A

Jane Thalen, Software Engineer, Nortel Networks

Speech Technology Magazine sits down with Jane Thalen of Nortel Networks to discuss everything about her recent Voice XML certification.

Voice Value

Addressing the Accessibility of TTY with VoIP

Results are back from early adopters and, according to Alex Hadden-Boyd, director of marketing for IP communications at Cisco, the ROIs are being measured in months, not years.