

Like Siri? Sonalight Brings Powerful Texting-By-Voice To Android - sskates
http://techcrunch.com/2011/10/12/like-siri-sonalight-brings-powerful-texting-by-voice-to-android

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Zhenya
Seems a little sneaky/dishonest of you to not mention the 20 incoming(EDIT:
should read compose) sms limit for the app, without paying $20/year.

Here is the copy from the android market:
<https://market.android.com/details?id=com.sonalight>

Text by Voice allows you to safely text while you drive entirely through
voice. There's no need to touch or look at the screen at all. Text by Voice
will automatically read incoming text messages aloud and give you a chance to
respond. You can also set an auto responder for incoming text messages, and
have Text by Voice start automatically when you start driving. Text by Voice
lets you compose texts on the fly. It runs in the background so you can use
other apps at the same time. Drive more safely with Text by Voice. Search
Keywords Text by Voice, TextbyVoice, Voice Recognition, Speech Recognition,
Hands Free, Speech, Text, SMS, Drive, Driving, Text While Driving, Sonalight,
Sonalite, Sonilight, Sonilite, Sonolight, Sonolight, Sonarlight, Sonarlite,
sona soni sono sonar light lite text by voice textbyvoice Email
dev@sonalight.com PHONE SPECIFIC NOTES: -Tested fully with no problems on
Motorola Droid, Motorola Droid 2, HTC Evo, HTC Droid Incredible, HTC Droid
Incredible 2, Nexus S, and T-Mobile G2 -Samsung Galaxy S microphone has lower
quality audio

~~~
sskates
The limit is only for composing a text. You can receive an unlimited number of
texts. Did you get the impression that you could send unlimited texts for
free? (serious question- it's not our intention at all)

~~~
Zhenya
Sorry, I definitely meant to write 'composing' not 'incoming'.

That is really the impression I got as it's not mentioned anywhere in your
description. I was wondering what your monetization scheme would have been. I
predict that you will open this up to unlimited texts and charge for other
actions.

~~~
sskates
We're going to be more flexible with our monetization in the next few weeks.
$20/year for unlimited was a last minute addition to the launch so that we
could get feedback like this. We don't want to pigeonhole ourselves into one
model just yet. Opening it up for unlimited sending and charging for other
actions is definitely on the table.

~~~
Zhenya
My other piece of advise is that I would stay far away from being compared to
Siri. You will by definition always lose, as you are not processing contextual
statements. Just bill this is a (big)improvement on Google Voice Actions.

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swombat
Like Siri? Here's something that's nothing like it.

~~~
weaksauce
Exactly... voice recognition for texting != conversational artificial
intelligent assistant. The frustrating thing is that my viewing their website
gave them some amount of ad revenue. I want that money going to accurate
reporting and insightful blogging.

~~~
bagelicious
I feel like the article was quite accurate--a slightly sensational title, but
"Texting-by-Voice" is qualified right there in the title.

Given the timing of this app, it's comparison to Siri seems to be quite
relevant.

~~~
bittermang
Not when their common thread is a single feature, voice.

Like red trucks? Here's a red bicycle.

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thedjpetersen
How is this better than google voice commands?

~~~
Zhenya
Touchless interaction. Google Voice Actions requires you to interact with the
phone via touch in most instances.

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negamax
OMG. Android is the new Linux and iOS new Windows. So jumping the ship to
iPhone asap

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sskates
We just launched. Would love HN's feedback (critical or otherwise).

~~~
reemrevnivek
Your app is nice, but it's nothing like Siri.

My dumb phone is an '07 Motorola Razr on Verizon's OS (see
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motorola_RAZR#Verizon_Wireless_...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motorola_RAZR#Verizon_Wireless_version)).
It has a button on the side that I press and a computerized voice says "Say a
command:" and lists the options:

    
    
        1. Call <Name> <Loc>
        2. Call <Number>
        3. Send Text <Name or #>
        4. Send Picture <Name or #>
        5. Lookup <Name>
        6. Go to <App>
        7. Check <Item>
    

It only understands these 7 commands. The voice processing wouldn't be good
enough to compose a text message, #3 just sets that up for you to key in, but
it's doing the job on a 50 MHz single-core ARM9 CPU instead of uploading it to
a server somewhere. I have no beliefs that the above task is anything like
Siri.

Siri is not about turning speech into text. That's been done already, everyone
else has a button on their phone that does this, and you're offering them this
familiar (and often broken or bad) functionality in an app for Android (Note:
I'm not implying that your app is broken or bad). As long as your app is like
what people are used to, you'll have a hard time of sales. Once you cross over
to the functionality of the well-marketed and Apple-branded Siri, you'll do
much better. Based on the description of your features, you're not there yet.

~~~
sskates
Our sense is that people don't want to use speech for everything ever, they'd
much rather use their hands and eyes when they're available. We're laser
focused on texting while driving right now, it's the one big use case for
voice commands.

We've done a lot of user testing and have found the biggest problem with voice
products now is that people try them twice or three times, and when they don't
work they decide to give up on using that product. No one wants to spend time
learning a user interface. So we've optimized our product for the first time
user experience for texting. We're offering what voice what Dropbox did for
cloud storage. There's nothing novel technology wise per se, only that the
product is optimized for ease-of-use.

With regards to Siri, we're interested to see how it'll perform once it gets
released into the wild.

~~~
dotBen
_We're laser focused on texting while driving right now, it's the one big use
case for voice commands._

Regardless of whether your app is same/better/worse than Siri, please please
please don't pursue a use case around texting while driving.

I'll skip my rant about the fact that texting while driving is dangerous even
if you remove the keyboard input (you still gotta read the reply messages @
65mph).

 _(EDIT: Ok, I see that your app will read texts too. Still doesn't negate the
following:)_

The issue you face is that as a second-class citizen app (ie not Google or the
device manufacturer) on my phone, here is my workflow to text while driving
using your app:

1) I decide I want to text

2) While driving, I have to feel my way around my phone to press the fiddly
"power" button at the top of the handset (let's assume it is in a cradle)

3) Oh, but wait I have screen-wipe security enabled, so I now got to dance my
finger across the screen - again, while doing 75mph _(yes, I like to drive
fast up the 280)_

4) Ok so now I'm in. But damn, I'm at the home screen. I got to find your app
- we'll assume I put it on the backdrop of the home screen. I press it and
wait for the app to load.

This all assumes that I put your app in a primary positon on my phone, that I
wasn't already in another app and so I had to press the home button, that the
home screen wasn't on a different 'pane' then the one your app icon is on, and
that your app starts recording voice commands as soon as I open it up.

Sorry, but that's still A LOT of steps, is dangerous, may not be legal in
California due to it being more then one button and makes a lot of
assumptions.

Google and the handset manufactures, who give themselves first-class citizen
access, have the advantage because they can add extra buttons for one-press
access. They can also use private APIs to potentially remove the screen lock
(although that has other issues associated with it). Apple, when they
integrate Siri into iPhone 4S, will presumably have similar advantages.

Sorry, I'm all for the little guy and the 3rd party ecosystem - but I'm also
for safety. As a driver (and motorcycle rider) I really fear people using
tools like yours while driving.

For that reason, I'm sorry, but I really hope your app is a failure.

~~~
sskates
We agree with you completely, we are very much for safety.

We are against people touching their phones while driving (it's illegal in
most states) and designed our product specifically so you don't have to touch
your phone.

It auto starts up when it detects you've begun driving via your speed from GPS
(go to Settings in the app to enable the auto start up). We also designed this
GPS detection to not suck battery life (it will take about 1% of your battery
every hour).

It works on phones even if the phone is in the passenger seat next to you- you
just have to make sure to talk loudly enough.

It will even pick up your voice if your phone is in your pocket (again, just
speak loudly enough) and you can hear it talk back to you.

No touching your phone or taking it out of your pocket required.

edit: also, no need to downvote this guy, it was an honest misunderstanding.

~~~
dotBen
Thank you for your answer - it does sound like you've tried hard to overcome
the issues and I'm sorry I've not yet tried your app.

How does this work if I have my phone set to turn off after x mins of activity
and/or screen lock?

~~~
sskates
If you have the "turn-on when driving" setting enabled, then our app will
acquire a CPU wake-lock that keeps it running (this is not a big drain on the
battery, about 1% per hour). Every three minutes we'll poll the GPS to see if
you're driving and then start the application up if GPS indicates your speed
is above 10mph. When it starts up it'll also notify you that it started up by
speaking aloud to you.

If your phone is entirely off (and not just sleeped/screen locked) then
there's nothing we can do about that... :)

Also if you have more questions, start a new comment thread in this post- the
reply timeout makes replying super slow.

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buff-a
voice recognition != voice comprehension

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soghol
am using "voice on the go" service for 2 years now. it always was a part of
their service (text by voice)

