Dictate from MacSpeech
Here's the short version ... so far Dictate has been a good enough product that it has made it worth dealing with MacSpeech again.
Now here's the whiny long version ... two MacWorld's ago I was looking for dictation software that I could use to make transcriptions for podcasts. I wanted two types of transcriptions -- one is a log file so I can get an idea of what's on the original file I capture and the other is a transcript of the final edited audio that I publish.
Getting software that can successfully figure out what more than one voice is saying is a hard problem. I don't expect anyone to have that nailed. My solution was to use myself as an intermediary. I went to an AFTRA workshop on using teleprompters and ear prompters a couple of years ago. With the ear prompter you repeat what you are hearing in your ear in your own voice at the right time. It enables you to work on camera without a visible script.
So my strategy was to listen to the audio in my ear and dictate it back into some transcription software. In theory this could work.
So there I was walking the floor at MacWorld and people kept recommending MacSpeech's iListen. I went to their booth and put up with being ignored for a while and was just about to leave when I got their attention. I bought a copy of the software -- well I didn't. They only gave you a download -- but that's ok. I bought that.
I had minor luck with the software and then it came time to install it on Leopard. I had to downgrade Safari because their installer couldn't work with the latest version of Safari. Then their software still wouldn't work right. Support told me that that's because I chose case sensitive when installing my OS and they couldn't work with that. They wanted me to reinstall my OS to make their program run.
So I had purchased software that didn't work and there were rumors that they had end-of-lifed it. Sure enough, at MacWorld this year there was Dictate. Their new product built on top of a different engine.
I was NOT going to give them more money. I had paid for the last version that didn't work. But friends kept telling me how much better this version was so eventually I ignored the fact that they were ignoring my emails and I upgraded.
Well I tried to upgrade. I never got to the screen asking for my credit card number. Instead I got a confirmation saying they had charged it to my P O. I don't have a P O. I wrote support and told them that. They never replied -- but I could view my order online and saw a notation from support asking that someone reset my account to one from which they could accept a credit card number. I still didn't hear anything back from support, but after a week this was reset and I ordered again.
Cutting to the end of the story -- this is a much better product. The training went smoothly and with considerably less training than the last version the accuracy is much higher.
I hate to recommend a product from a company with such poor customer support, but I have been very happy with Dictate. It is good enough that I ordered it despite the company that sells it.
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I purchased MacSpeech today hoping it might make my work tasks a little easier. I am NOT computer savvy and typing is a difficult task for me (disability). So, I bought this voice recognition software thinking it could help me creat letters and emails in a more efficient manner than my horrible typing skills had been doing. After many hours, I am throwing in the towel! $300 down the drain for a crappy piece of software that cannot recognize even the simplest of words and inserts words that are meaningless. I spend more time correcting the mistakes of MacSPeech than t takes to finger peck the document from scratch.
I purchased MacSpeech today hoping it might make my work tasks a little easier. I am NOT computer savvy and typing is a difficult task for me (disability). So, I bought this voice recognition software thinking it could help me creat letters and emails in a more efficient manner than my horrible typing skills had been doing. After many hours, I am throwing in the towel! $300 down the drain for a crappy piece of software that cannot recognize even the simplest of words and inserts words that are meaningless. I spend more time correcting the mistakes of MacSPeech than t takes to finger peck the document from scratch.
Well I bought Macspeech to use for transcribing interviews and it has never functioned. I have only what the Macspeech rep told me to confirm that it will not do the job I purchased it for. It has been over 2 months trying to get them to handle a simple exchange on the usb and microphone. First, they said I need to fax them a copy of the purchase order to verify when and where I purchased it, even though I had registered it online. Second, they charged me to set up a warranty claim??? Once they had their money they put me on ignor. Lastly, (to date) They told me I need to either return it to the retailer or send the parts to the parts manufacturer?? Where is the warranty service???? Their excuse is that they are a small company, in my opinion they should not be in business at all and likely will not based on their extremely poor customer service. I would say extremely poor customer service they deliver but honestly they don't even deliver poor customer service, they just put you on ignore. Hope to read soon that they are no longer in business it would be worth the loss of the cost of the program.
Thanks, Daniel. I always enjoy how you turn these experiences into narratives of Good and Evil.
How much longer does it take to re-speak the interview and then edit the text? Several years ago, I wrote some AppleScripts to control the QuickTime Player from my keyboard because I figured it would be faster just to type once and get it right the first time:
Turn Your Mac into an Audio Transcriber