Category Archives: Audio

The current state of audio search

Online audio is definitely on an upswing, fueled by the iPod revolution, improved online playback, and broadband penetration. Audio search is keeping up with demand for new content, thanks in part to national security spending in the Cold War and beyond. In this post I will outline the current state of audio search, and how machines make sense of spoken word, progressing from easy to difficult. First, let’s define the space. I’m interested how a search engine might index content with non-professionally produced metadata. The President’s weekly radio address contains a full transcript. Music catalogs are available for purchase from…

Odeo audio messages

Odeo introduced some new features last week including extended profiles and the ability to send any Odeo member an audio message. I’ve been asking Ev for audio comments for a few months and I’m glad it’s finally here! Anyone with a Flash player can send an audio message to an Odeo member. You can add a special button to your podcast site and instantly collect audio comments for each episode. Choose from over 20 pre-made buttons to include on your site and you can enable audio comments in minutes. I added a “Send me an Odeo” button to my contact…

VoIP, not just for cheap calls

The latest episode of Om and Niall PodSessions is now available. This week Om and I talk about VoIP and the new applications with seamless integration of new voice technologies. A recent study by In-Stat found 73% of all VoIP subscribers have migrated to VoIP without making a conscious decision to adopt the new technology. On Sunday my dad asked me about Vonage, and the various boxes he saw advertised with the services in the Sunday newspaper inserts. To him, Vonage was just another long distance provider and happened to have cheap rates to call Ireland. He had no clue…

Odeo Studio released

Odeo just released their online audio recording software called Odeo Studio. Odeo Studio was previously available to a limited group of users. The new version 0.14 is the first public release of the software. Giving people the ability to record content via a web page or telephone takes away a lot of the complexity of podcasting or casual voice message creation. No worries about getting the proper recording software, encoding the audio, uploading to a server. Now all you have to do is hit record on a web page and everything is done for you. Recordings are limited to…

Digital identity event at Future Salon

Last night I attended a Future Salon presentation about digital and online identities. The event was hosted at SAP in Palo Alto. Eric Sachs of Google spoke about Google’s relatively new entry into the digital identity realm with services such as Orkut and Gmail. Jeff Hodges of Liberty Alliance talked about identity systems in the enterprise marketplace. Fen Labalme of Identity Commons talked about identity systems built at the grassroots level for non-governmental organizations. I recorded all three speeches as well as the question and answer period using a directional microphone from my seat in the front row. Eric Sachs…

NeroSoft TimeTrax: Record XM Radio to MP3

NeroSoft TimeTrax is an application for XM Satellite Radio subscribers with XM PCR hardware that allows users to convert the XM Satellite Radio stream into individual MP3 (with complete ID3 information) or WAV files per song. You can also limit your recordings by artist. See the documentation pages for more details. (via Gizmodo)…