My blind friend David Faucheux and I are going to have to compare notes. Luckily, I can see, but, at least for the moment, I’m using a form of technology for the disabled. It isn’t a speech synthesizer like David’s; rather, the opposite–voice recognition.
Dragon NaturallySpeaking 8 Preferred is just the ticket for me right now, as a way to rest my overused left arm (a typing victim). In some ways, Dragon Eight is the digital equivalent of Nader, David’s late seeing eye dog. Like “Nader,” this thing requires training, and sometimes I feel as if speaking to a canine or even a human. When I want to shut the microphone off, I say, “Go to sleep.” I can just imagine encouraging my faithful servant Nader to take a nice, well-earned snooze at the foot of my bed. And in the morning? “Wake up.” Yes, that’s what Dragon Eight responds to.
So is there an e-book angle here? Well, maybe indirectly. First off, if you’re in a quiet home office, voice recognition software probably will do better than in a noisy office; at least, that’s my guess. And if you’re at home, you probably won’t be as close to a seller of paper books as you would be in a typical office. So you might appreciate e-books a little more.
Another e-book angle is that Dragon’s proofreading voice is much nicer than that of Microsoft Sam, so I just might try it out as a speech synthesizer and compare a few notes with the other David.
Detail: Yes, I’m still using my right hand, some of the time for moving the cursor around, and from time to time I “cheat” with my left; I’m not a “pure” Dragon user. Just the same, this thing has its charms–and even a bit of an ego. Already, it’s found an excuse to be brand-conscious and capitalize the word “Dragon” much of the time without any help from the human.
Thanks: To Murray Altheim, who encouraged me to take the plunge.
