Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

'Dragon Dictation' Brings Voice Transcription to the iPhone

MacRumors

MacRumors

macrumors bot
Original poster
Apr 12, 2001
63,469
30,691



150049-dragon_dictation_500.jpg


Nuance Communications today announced the release of Dragon Dictation [App Store, Free for a limited time], a new voice transcription application for the iPhone. The application, which relies on the Dragon NaturallySpeaking speech recognition engine to transcribe voice input to text, allows users to easily send transcribed text to new e-mail or text messages or save it to the clipboard for pasting into other applications.
With the Dragon Dictation App, spoken words are instantly transcribed using the world-renowned power of Dragon NaturallySpeaking speech recognition, giving anyone the power to simply "say anything" up to five times faster than typing. Dragon Dictation allows users to speak anything from a one-line text message or status update for Facebook, to a multi-paragraph e-mail. For instance, simply say, "We should meet at the restaurant at 7 and then go to the movies. I'll pick up Scott in Cupertino after he gets off work. See you then." Users can start and stop as needed or just speak free form to capture a quick brainstorm idea or reminder. It's completely up to you.
Click to expand...
The application works by transmitting spoken input to Nuance's central servers, where it is processed by the transcription algorithms and returned to the user's device. Consequently, the application does requires a data connection in order to function.

The application offers editing options including alternative suggestions for misinterpreted phrases and built-in keyboard functionality for manual editing of text. The application also offers voice corrections, allowing users to highlight a selected portion of text and replace it with newly-spoken phrases.

Several users have noted a potential privacy issue with Dragon Dictation, however, with a number of iTunes Store user reviews noting that the license agreement for the application reveals that data from users' lists of contacts will be sent to Nuance and stored on its servers.

Dragon Dictation is free for a limited time, and Nuance will in the near future be releasing Dragon Search, a second iPhone application allowing users to conduct voice searches of a number of sources including search engines, YouTube, Twitter, iTunes, and Wikipedia.

Article Link: 'Dragon Dictation' Brings Voice Transcription to the iPhone
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2009/12/08/dragon-dictation-brings-voice-transcription-to-the-iphone/
N

njl

macrumors regular
Mar 15, 2009
148
0
SAT
supposedly, this application loads you contact list onto their server, so for those of you that have privacy in mind, be aware.

:)
 
Vandam500

Vandam500

macrumors 68000
Sep 29, 2008
1,843
104
njl said:
supposedly, this application loads you contact list onto their server, so for those of you that have privacy in mind, be aware.

:)
Click to expand...

Damn I installed it last night...guess it's too late for me? And why in the WORLD do they need to store our contacts list... A even better question, why did Apple approve this? Sigh
 
Pravda

Pravda

macrumors 6502a
Sep 30, 2008
807
62
Philly
njl said:
supposedly, this application loads you contact list onto their server, so for those of you that have privacy in mind, be aware.

:)
Click to expand...


They say its only contacts names and not phone numbers or emails.

I don't have an issue with them having my contacts name, but if it's anything more than that, then yeah, it would be an issue for me.
 
Pravda

Pravda

macrumors 6502a
Sep 30, 2008
807
62
Philly
lightpeak said:
Have you ever done a Google search on the words "dragon naturally-speaking reviews"? It's spotty at best and expensive.
Click to expand...

Not sure about reviews for their software, but the iphone app is dead on.
Been playing with it for hours now, and i would say its about 95% for me.
 
pagansoul

pagansoul

macrumors 65816
Aug 10, 2006
1,040
42
Earth
This is great. It works really well. I have a very small contact list and tend to use nick names.
 
Schizoid

Schizoid

macrumors 65816
May 29, 2008
1,042
1,312
UK
Can we use this for remote wipe?

"Computer, initiate auto-destruct sequence, authorization Picard 4-7 Alpha Tango."
 
HiVolt

HiVolt

macrumors 68000
Sep 29, 2008
1,649
6,046
Toronto, Canada
Not available in the Canadian app-store. Lame.

I wonder what the reason for this is. It's not tied to any broadcast or print media that have country restrictions.

Someone should make a really kickass app and not make it available to the Americans. I wonder what the reaction would be.
 
macduke

macduke

macrumors G5
Jun 27, 2007
13,130
19,649
This app is really amazing if there isn't a whole lot of background noise. I installed it yesterday and so far it's been solid. I have already placed it on the first page of my utilities section on my iPhone it's that good!!
 
notjustjay

notjustjay

macrumors 603
Sep 19, 2003
6,056
167
Canada, eh?
I remember first playing with this technology back in 1999. The box came with a little microphone headset and everything. I was pretty impressed. I imagine that the engine has improved over the past decade.

I wonder how much horespower the recognition engine requires, and if we could have a version anytime soon that runs on your own phone instead of uploading it to the "cloud".
 
S

sososowhat

macrumors 6502
Feb 20, 2003
287
42
Palo Alto, CA
SPEECH DATA == Transcripts Saved

Maskusee said:
They say its only contacts names and not phone numbers or emails.

I don't have an issue with them having my contacts name, but if it's anything more than that, then yeah, it would be an issue for me.
Click to expand...

Read the "ACCEPT" text carefully. It's not only contacts but "SPEECH DATA" that are saved. That data includes transcripts of everything you ever dictate. They are very explicit that these transcripts may be available to the government upon subpoena. It says "speech data means the audio files, associated transcriptions and log files".

At first I found this shocking - and I didn't press "ACCEPT". On second thought, this is exactly the same as using Gmail, etc. which have records of all your emails. I'm still wrestling with it, but I think I'm ok with it.
 
Sedulous

Sedulous

macrumors 68030
Dec 10, 2002
2,530
2,577
I'm going no where near it. My contacts trust me not to sell them out for an app.
 
Cleverboy

Cleverboy

macrumors 65816
May 25, 2007
1,435
1
Pocket Universe, nth Dimensional Complex Manifold
SirROM said:
Using it. Loving it.
'Nuf said!
Click to expand...
Agreed. You'd never know from many of the comments, but this is ABSOLUTELY EXCELLENT. Now. How much will they eventually charge for it? Who knows, but I'll tell you... Jott... they're screwed. I will be canceling my $4 monthly subscription immediately. This is VERY quick and doesn't leave me with the impression I'm being run through Mechanical Turk.

~ CB
 
I

iNtrigued

macrumors member
Nov 20, 2008
85
0
Texas
Privacy issue: collection of contact info? What for?

Maskusee said:
They say its only contacts names and not phone numbers or emails.

I don't have an issue with them having my contacts name, but if it's anything more than that, then yeah, it would be an issue for me.
Click to expand...


Hey guys, perhaps the contacts name will be used for future voice dial or something for iPod users or for people that don't own a 3GS....??

who knows............:cool:
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom