Science Fiction Dictionary
A  B  C  D  E  F  G  H  I  J  K  L  M  N  O  P  Q  R  S  T  U  V  W  X  Y  Z

 

Google Seeks Pohl's Joymaker Voice Recognition

The joymaker is a remarkably prescient science-fictional invention by Frederik Pohl; he describes it in his 1965 novel The Age of the Pussyfoot. In the story, the joymaker has no screen and no keyboard; it uses voice recognition to accept requests and commands from users:

"Self-programming" means that the programmed software includes procedures for translating most normal variations of voice, idiom, accent, and other variable modalities into a computer-oriented sim-script and thence into the mathematical expressions on which the computers operate. As long as your personal joymaker is within reception range of your voice, you may communicate via other shared-time transponders if you wish.
(Read more about Pohl's voice-enabled smartphone)

Vic Gundotra, vice-president of Engineering for Google, talked at some length about exactly this sort of smartphone feature at the Google IO conference; start at about 21:00 into the following video for his discussion and excellent examples.


(Google voice recognition - start at 21:00)

"Google, starting several years ago, really made a deep investment in voice recognition. We recognized that the mobile device, because of its limited input capability, would be the platform in which people used voice input more than any other platform.

"In fact, we see a stunning number of queries being done on mobile devices where the input is a human voice."

Pohl would be proud.

Scroll down for more stories in the same category. (Story submitted 6/23/2010)

Follow this kind of news @Technovelgy.

| Email | RSS | Blog It | Stumble | del.icio.us | Digg | Reddit |

Would you like to contribute a story tip? It's easy:
Get the URL of the story, and the related sf author, and add it here.

Comment/Join discussion ( 0 )

Related News Stories - (" Artificial Intelligence ")

Teslas Have Minds, Says Elon Musk
'The machine scans the patterns of the mind; ...Impress these same waves on a robot computer.' - Frederik Pohl, 1955.

Are You Ready To Zoom With Dr. ChatGPT?
'Skarwold pushed a switch and Katz’s autodoc sprayed sedative into his lungs.' - Larry Niven, 1965.

Ancient Cuneiform Texts Translated By AI - Sort Of
"I believe they're trying to communicate with us..." - Schachner and Zagat, 1931.

AI Tutors For Every Child - Thanks, DARPA!
'...fullest attention to the visions and voices which were poured directly in to his mind.' - James Blish, 1951.

 

Google
  Web TechNovelgy.com   

Technovelgy (that's tech-novel-gee!) is devoted to the creative science inventions and ideas of sf authors. Look for the Invention Category that interests you, the Glossary, the Invention Timeline, or see what's New.

 

 

 

 

Science Fiction Timeline
1600-1899
1900-1939
1940's   1950's
1960's   1970's
1980's   1990's
2000's   2010's

Current News

Barista Robot Perfects Latte Swirl With Multi-DOF Wriggle
'It's done with a flip of the third joint of the tentacle on the down beat.'

Vendetta 2023 All-Terrain Skateboard Could Use Neal Stephenson's Smartwheels
'If you surf over a bump... If you surf over a pothole...'

Safe Street Rebel Autonomous Vehicle Luddites And Schachner's 1931 Robot-Deranger
'Then the spreading beam of the deranging ray struck them, and they stood an instant transfixed...'

The Electric Balance Bicycle And The Decline Of Western Civilization
'Noiselessly, on rubber-tired wheels, they journeyed...'

'Droplet' Battery Microscale Power Pack
'...a power pack the size of a pea.'

ARX-5 Doing Robot Arm Dancing
It's Data's day - at last.

CD, DVD Bit Rot And PKD's Civic Notification Distorter
'...copy two of the original document no longer can be superimposed on copy one.'

Inbiodroid Prometheus 2.0 Telepresence Avatar Robot
My prize robot, tall, dashing would speak and act for me...

Amazon One Is Frank Herbert's Palm Lock
'A palm lock must be keyed to one individual's hand shape and palm lines.'

DroneDog Ground Security Robot Dogs From Asylon
'I have transferred the ego of a dog to a synthetic dog brain in the skull case of a robot dog.'

Who Knows What Might Be Found When Visiting A Metal Asteroid?
'...inspect the tiny speck of matter that swam toward them out of the bottomless void.'

Giant Lunar Surface Test Bed Built On Earth
Astronauts first walked the site, then flew over the site at a few hundred feet in a small Cessna.

FlyCroTug Drones Work In Teams Now
'It slid smoothly out of its cell like a metal wasp emerging from its nest, and hung in midair.'

Zai Pits (West Sahel) And Dew Collectors (Dune)
'Each is planted most tenderly in its own little pit.'

Delivery Robots Being Bullied, Robbed
'Robots have worse problems than anybody.' (A Present for Pat)

Zoom Education Idea Is 100 Years Old
'... the frosted glass squares began, one by one, to show the faces and shoulders of a peculiar type of young men.'

More SF in the News Stories

More Beyond Technovelgy science news stories

Home | Glossary | Invention Timeline | Category | New | Contact Us | FAQ | Advertise |
Technovelgy.com - where science meets fiction™

Copyright© Technovelgy LLC; all rights reserved.