Thursday, May 28, 2020

iPhone vs. Pixel Dictation

James Cham:

I don’t think that people appreciate how different the voice to text experience on a Pixel is from an iPhone. So here is a little head to head example. The Pixel is so responsive it feels like it is reading my mind!

Speed has its own quality—the current model for speech is like a command line. You say something and wait for a response. Now that voice to text is fast and uses fewer resources than you would think, there’s a chance for truly interactive voice experiences.

Also look at the latency when asking Siri to pause or adjust the volume of the audio that’s playing.

John Gruber:

What really sticks out about this is that in so many regards, Apple’s accessibility features are both awesome and far ahead of everyone else. Yet voice-to-text transcription is an obvious accessibility feature, and on this front Apple is and long has been woefully behind. If Apple’s voice-to-text transcription were good, it wouldn’t just improve the ways we use (or try to use) it now — truly good voice-to-text would enable all sorts of new Star Trek-level interactions while editing text. Quick fixes in Messages, Mail, or wherever you happen to be typing.

Dave Mark:

So I turned on Airplane Mode and the iPhone [STT] is every bit as fast as the Android [STT].

Turn Airplane Mode off, lag returns. Try it yourself!!

Not at all sure why this lag is necessary.

Kirk McElhearn:

I’ve seen that too. I think it does more processing / checking when you have internet access. I find it more accurate when it does have internet access, in fact.

Previously:

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Gruber:

> "Appleā€™s accessibility features are both awesome and far ahead of everyone else."

I really doubt Gruber has thoroughly tested the accessibility features on other devices in order to know Apple's are "far ahead of everyone else".

It's not the first time Gruber says stuff like this with little knowledge on Apple's rivals.

That's in native English. The second the speech has even a slight foreign accent or even some foreign name and terms Apple falls behind way way more pitifully.

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