LOS ANGELES — As an increasing number of consumers turn to keyboard-scarce mobile devices for more than making phone calls, voices are replacing fingers as the navigational tool of choice.
Speech recognition is continually improving, advancing through concepts such as deep learning, which helps computers better understand spoken words, as well as through neural networks that could change the way in which man interacts with machines.
“Neural network algorithms are hitting the mainstream, making computers smarter in new and exciting ways,” Robert McMillan recently wrote for Wired. “Google has used them to beef up Android’s voice recognition. IBM uses them. And, most remarkably, Microsoft uses neural networks as part of the Star-Trek-like Skype Translate, which translates what you say into another language almost instantly.”
This real-time translation technology could prove most beneficial to adult website operators, especially those working in the live cam arena, where language barriers between performers and consumers could dissolve, thus delivering better communications and resulting increases in profits.
Non-voice real-time translation systems are already in use by cam sites such as Jasmin.com, but voice control would provide a more “hands-free” environment fostering a far better user experience.
There is a player seemingly missing in the rush to improve speech recognition, however — Apple, which may be the company most associated with voice recognition and response, via its Siri service — but this situation may be about to change.
McMillan hinted that a new internal speech recognition team is developing a next generation neural-net-boosted Siri system, revamping Apple’s breakthrough service that is long overdue for an upgrade. He notes that Apple has been on a hiring spree, acquiring top talent such as Alex Acero, a Microsoft, speech technology researcher with two decades of experience, as well as researchers from Nuance, the company that developed Siri, including Gunnar Evermann, along with Arnab Ghoshal from the University of Edinburgh.
It is a heavy dose of intellectual firepower, pointing towards Apple jumping into the deep end of digital voice recognition, bringing the technology further into the mainstream and perhaps further into porn as well, as its usefulness becomes ever more apparent.
Regardless of the intended usage of voice control by its creators, it could bring an added level of accessibility and enjoyment to adult entertainment that forward-looking operators and consumers may find irresistible.
