Voice user interfaces are transforming customer experiences. Learn key principles, benefits, challenges, and to create intuitive and future-

seen from Malaysia
seen from Australia
seen from Türkiye
seen from United States
seen from Singapore

seen from Spain
seen from Germany
seen from Ireland

seen from Mexico

seen from Türkiye
seen from Canada
seen from China

seen from Netherlands

seen from Malaysia
seen from Mexico
seen from Mexico
seen from Australia

seen from Türkiye
seen from United States
seen from China
Voice user interfaces are transforming customer experiences. Learn key principles, benefits, challenges, and to create intuitive and future-

Anya is live and ready to show you everything. Watch her strip, dance, and perform exclusive shows just for you. Interact in real-time and make your fantasies come true.
Free to watch ⢠No registration required ⢠HD streaming
Locutius Letter #18
A note on AI vs ML before we get into this newsletter: I prefer to use the term ML (Machine Learning) over AI because I want us, as humans who make things, to understand that we are responsible for these outcomes. Weāre the ones who teach these machines or provide data sets (or weāre the ones that make the machines that teach themselves) and we need to be considerate about what weāre doing. It's semantics, but meaning matters.
š š¼š š¼š š¼
Microsoft kicks off AI for Accessibility
Today Microsoft announced a $25 million, 5-year program to āput AI tools in the hands of developers to accelerate the development of accessible and intelligent AI solutions to benefit the 1 billion-plus people with disabilities around the world.ā
Yes, that press release really does say āintelligent [artificial intelligence]ā
Worldwide, only 10% of people with disabilities have access to assistive technology, so itāll be interesting to see if itās better to make more tech available or ā¦. Maybe just give more money to people with disabilities? (see this article on cash transfers)
AI for Accessibility has three components:
Providing seed grants of technology to developers, NGOs, universities, and inventors, so that they can do AI-first work
Identifying project with potential and providing more investment so they can scale
Embedding inclusive design and AI across all Microsoft products and helping partners improve the accessibility of their offerings
Read more about MicrosoftāsĀ AI for Accessibility program on their blogĀ (there doesnāt seem to be a website yet - but there is a website for the AI for Earth program they launched last year:Ā https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/aiforearth)
Thinking about implementing ML for your product?
Review Martin ZinkevichāsĀ Rules of Machine Learning: Best Practices for ML Engineering (PDF)
Brraaaaaains
Last weekend I got to hang out with a friend who is a neuroimaging specialist. We had a fun conversation about education theory (weāre both former teachers) and we discussed the history of humanityās understanding of the brain. Have you ever thought about how in the past, we only knew what different parts of the brain did because:
Someone got stabbed in the head or injured and something about their memory, ability, or personality changed
Something about a personās memory, ability, or personality changed and after they died we cut open their head and looked for damage.
Thanks, brain injuries!
Learn about the brain:Ā What brain regions control our language?
Read the rest of theĀ Brain Control series on The Conversation
š¤ š¤ š¤
Research highlight: Voicesetting: Voice Authoring UIs for Improved Expressivity in Augmentative Communication
Microsoft Research is working on adding emotion to TTS via emoji, tested with participants with ALS, a neurological disease that causes muscle weakness.
Summary YouTube video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q4FcvvbCM9Y
The paper: https://cs.stanford.edu/~merrie/papers/voicesetting.pdf
The real-life project itās related to: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/project/hands-free-keyboard/
Why people need it: The ALS Association on Augmentative Communication
Accessibility roundup!
Making something for humans? Hereās a set of tips for designing accessibility into VUIs / UX Collective
5 things Pinterest changed to make its app better for people who are blind / Mashable
Voice should be user-friendly to all users Focus on cognitive impairment, but this advice applies to most VUI use / Speech Tech Magazine
Designing interfaces for the visually impaired Includes references to VUIās, but the non-VUI parts are most interesting/helpful. The VUI parts are a recitation of a Nielsen report. / Stina Olofsson
VUI development for Korean people with dysarthria Researchers prototype and test a customizable VUI that works for people with slow or slurred speech (could be from trauma, a stroke, neurological disorders) / JOURNAL OF ASSISTIVE TECHNOLOGIES
Accessibility features on Alexa + How to turn on the VoiceView screen reader Yep, the Amazon feature list. I turned on captioning on my Echo Show - have I mentioned lately how much I love captioning? I have it permanently on on my Netflix account.
How deep learning is helping the blind āseeā āStevie Wonder uses it every day, which is pretty cool,ā said Anirudh Koul, a senior data scientist with Microsoft, during a presentation at the GPU Technology Conference. / nvidia blog
ššš
VUI news & links I want to get out of my queue before Google I/O starts
How Indian startups gear up to take on the voice assistants of Apple, Amazon and Google What sets these start-ups apart? Theyāre multi-lingual from the get-go. Ā / The Economic Times
Why Google Assistant will beat Siri, Alexa and Cortana Mike Elgan argues that success in the assistant space requires total ubiquity / Computer World
How Voice-First Technology Helps Older Adults This article offers a good overview of some VUI research with older adults the the current state of the āVUI for seniorsā market / Forbes
Sensory Brings Low-Power Wake Words to Mobile Apps Now apps could have wake words, too. / Sensory blog
Amazon finally opens up Alexa to developers to make money off third-party skills Developers get 70 percent of revenue from the in-skill purchase / The Verge
Sonos announces June 6th event for new home theater speaker with Alexa It has an HDMI port (so it *could* control your TV) and it has a VUI / The Verge
The Elements of Multi-Modal Design with Karen Kaushansky ā Voicebot Podcast Ep. 40 / Voicebot.ai
Read this thread from Liz Jackson on how disabled creators were erased from the Cooper Hewitt Access + Ability exhibit / Liz Jackson on Twitter
Alexa, can you hear me? Bravo to Vocalize.ai for highlighting algorithmic bias in their report on performing black-box evaluations of ASR systems / Vocalize.ai via PR Web (I know, š¤·)
ššš
Reading status
Iām still reading the three books I mentioned last week (Fascism,Ā Robots, and. . .Ā Robots), but I couldnāt resist picking upĀ Dear Ijeawele, or A Feminist Manifesto in Fifteen SuggestionsĀ by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. I have a son, but Iām still raising a feminist.
Until next week!
ššš
Abi Jones Editor, Locutius
Is there something I missed? Reply to this post with a link! Want to chat? Iām on Twitter atĀ @jonesabi
Yes, this newsletter contains affiliate links.
Finally, the opinions in this newsletter are mine, not my employerās.