Great news, technology is booming. Writers have more options than ever before to get their writing out there. The first step, getting the written words into a format that can be submitted, shouldn’t be the hardest step. Voice recognition software is one tool that can increase a writer’s productivity. If you are partially fluent in computer usage and have thirty minutes to install software and talk through several paragraphs for the software to learn your individual profile, you can speak your writing into any text format.
Without a doubt, I wouldn’t be writing this or anything for that matter without voice recognition software. So, the most obvious positive of this technology is the ability to get my thoughts, my words, my writing into a usable format. Voice recognition works on both PCs and Macs. Users can access the web, email, and most other software applications using their voice alone.
Each use allows the software to improve its knowledge of the user’s speech patterns, it learns as you progress, making editing easier the more it’s used. The user speaks normally which helps with the flow of sentences, making punctuation usage clearer. Since each word is spoken aloud, into a headset microphone, stilted language especially dialogue can be heard and quickly corrected.
I couldn’t point out the positives without following up with some drawbacks. Since the software interprets what it believes you said, errors do happen. Some of the most common include words spelled two or more ways, proper names, foreign words, and just plain misunderstanding the user. This can make editing your writing cumbersome and may require actual keyboarding. Also, the user will need to learn commands since you must dictate punctuation, capitalization, and cursor movement.
Yet, I wouldn’t give up my voice recognition for anything.
During NaNoWriMo, I wished for voice recognition on the days I couldn’t put fingers to the keyboard. Maybe next year!