back to article Mozilla hoping to open source voice samples for future AI devs

Mozilla has decided speech recognition should be open source, and has launched a project to achieve just that, Project Common Voice. What the browser builder wants, it says, is an open source data set for voice recognition apps. The open source community, Mozilla's Daniel Kessler writes, is the “next wave of innovators” – but …

  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Appy app apps

    I don't think Mozilla should try to develop things just because they're currently trendy. Speech recognition appears to be inextricably tied to the next corporate data-grab.

    Nor have I seen a non-evil use of speech recognition, and the current drive is purely to reduce the "friction" of consumerism, so people can just blurt out the shit they need, and Amazon will stick it on their credit card.

    1. Robert Carnegie Silver badge

      Re: Appy app apps

      The late Sir Terry Pratchett latterly wrote novels using computer speech recognition when he couldn't type due to his illness. Although, these being about wizards and goblins and things, maybe you don't count that non-evil.

  2. Haku

    "I'm sorry Dave, I'm afraid I can't do that."

    Sci-fi films/tv have had people talking to computers since the start but my interaction with computers began with almost unresponsive flat keyboards (ZX81) which progressed to rubber ones (Spectrum) then 'proper' keyboards (BBC Micros), then mice, then touchpads & touchscreens (not forgetting joysticks/joypads for gaming), which could explain why it always feels weird talking to my phone unless I'm actually making a call.

    Are those futurists still predicting everyone interacting with computers through speech? Because for many uses it's far simpler/quicker/easier to press buttons/screens than to talk to the device.

  3. AMBxx Silver badge
    Thumb Down

    Dear Mozilla

    Stop mucking about with the latest trend and concentrate on making Firefox as good as Chrome.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Dear Mozilla

      Last time I looked, Mozilla was spending its time making Firefox Chrome. Might be just me.

  4. Nick Kew

    Once upon a time ...

    ... I worked in speech recognition. And I seem to recollect working with open source data, too.

    OK, noone called it open source. The term had yet to be coined: we had Free Software (and the GNU brand was familiar among Beards), but the term Open Source was still some way off.

    The article seems light on detail of what Moz has actually announced, and how it differs from what's been around for a very long time. Guess I'll just have to look at Moz itself to see what's new.

    1. Mage Silver badge

      Re: Once upon a time ...

      Yes, oddly there are Open source Speech recognition tools on Linux already.

      1. wayward4now
        Linux

        Re: Once upon a time ...

        Yes, oddly there are Open source Speech recognition tools on Linux already.

        Right, but the really good voice samples have been proprietary.

        1. Robert Carnegie Silver badge

          Re: Once upon a time ...

          I think Thomas Edison's early cylinder recordings are coming into the public domain. The cutoff unfortunately is, and will always be, when Mickey Mouse started to make talkies.

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