Vox ex Machina
How today's digital devices got their voices, and how we learned to listen to them.From early robots to toys like the iconic Speak & Spell to Apple's Siri, Vox ex Machina tells the fascinating story of how scientists and engineers developed voices for machines during the twentieth century. Sarah Bel...
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| Format: | Online |
| Language: | English |
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The MIT Press
2024
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| Online Access: | ONIX_20241025_9780262375870_86 |
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| _version_ | 1869528070381109248 |
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| author | Bell, Sarah A. |
| author_browse | Bell, Sarah A. |
| author_facet | Bell, Sarah A. |
| author_sort | Bell, Sarah A. |
| collection | Directory of Open Access Books |
| description | How today's digital devices got their voices, and how we learned to listen to them.From early robots to toys like the iconic Speak & Spell to Apple's Siri, Vox ex Machina tells the fascinating story of how scientists and engineers developed voices for machines during the twentieth century. Sarah Bell chronicles the development of voice synthesis from buzzy electrical current and circuitry in analog components to the robotic sounds of early digital signal processing to today's human sounding applications. Along the way, Bell also shows how the public responded to these technologies and asks whether talking machines are even good for us. Using a wide range of intriguing examples, Vox ex Machina is embedded in a wider story about people—describing responses to voice synthesis technologies that often challenged prevailing ideas about computation and automation promoted by boosters of the Information Age. Bell helps explain why voice technologies came to sound and to operate in the way they do—influenced as they were by a combination of technical assumptions and limitations, the choices of the corporations that deploy them, and the habits that consumers developed over time.A beautifully written book that will appeal to anyone with a healthy skepticism toward Silicon Valley, Vox ex Machina is an important and timely contribution to our cultural histories of information, computing, and media. |
| format | Online |
| id | doab-20.500.12854ir-146708 |
| institution | Directory of Open Access Books |
| language | eng |
| publishDate | 2024 |
| publishDateRange | 2024 |
| publishDateSort | 2024 |
| publisher | The MIT Press |
| publisherStr | The MIT Press |
| record_format | ojs |
| spelling | doab-20.500.12854ir-1467082024-10-25T13:17:49Z Vox ex Machina Bell, Sarah A. speech synthesis digital assistants voice technology history of technology thema EDItEUR::T Technology, Engineering, Agriculture, Industrial processes::TB Technology: general issues::TBX History of engineering and technology thema EDItEUR::P Mathematics and Science::PD Science: general issues::PDR Impact of science and technology on society How today's digital devices got their voices, and how we learned to listen to them.From early robots to toys like the iconic Speak & Spell to Apple's Siri, Vox ex Machina tells the fascinating story of how scientists and engineers developed voices for machines during the twentieth century. Sarah Bell chronicles the development of voice synthesis from buzzy electrical current and circuitry in analog components to the robotic sounds of early digital signal processing to today's human sounding applications. Along the way, Bell also shows how the public responded to these technologies and asks whether talking machines are even good for us. Using a wide range of intriguing examples, Vox ex Machina is embedded in a wider story about people—describing responses to voice synthesis technologies that often challenged prevailing ideas about computation and automation promoted by boosters of the Information Age. Bell helps explain why voice technologies came to sound and to operate in the way they do—influenced as they were by a combination of technical assumptions and limitations, the choices of the corporations that deploy them, and the habits that consumers developed over time.A beautifully written book that will appeal to anyone with a healthy skepticism toward Silicon Valley, Vox ex Machina is an important and timely contribution to our cultural histories of information, computing, and media. 2024-10-25T13:17:48Z 2024-10-25T13:17:48Z 2024 book ONIX_20241025_9780262375870_86 9780262375870 9780262546355 https://directory.doabooks.org/handle/20.500.12854/146708 eng The MIT Press image/jpeg n/a https://doi.org/10.7551/mitpress/14208.001.0001 The MIT Press The MIT Press 10.7551/mitpress/14208.001.0001 10.7551/mitpress/14208.001.0001 ae0cf962-f685-4933-93d1-916defa5123d 9780262375870 9780262546355 The MIT Press 256 Cambridge open access |
| spellingShingle | speech synthesis digital assistants voice technology history of technology thema EDItEUR::T Technology, Engineering, Agriculture, Industrial processes::TB Technology: general issues::TBX History of engineering and technology thema EDItEUR::P Mathematics and Science::PD Science: general issues::PDR Impact of science and technology on society Bell, Sarah A. Vox ex Machina |
| title | Vox ex Machina |
| title_full | Vox ex Machina |
| title_fullStr | Vox ex Machina |
| title_full_unstemmed | Vox ex Machina |
| title_short | Vox ex Machina |
| title_sort | vox ex machina |
| topic | speech synthesis digital assistants voice technology history of technology thema EDItEUR::T Technology, Engineering, Agriculture, Industrial processes::TB Technology: general issues::TBX History of engineering and technology thema EDItEUR::P Mathematics and Science::PD Science: general issues::PDR Impact of science and technology on society |
| topic_facet | speech synthesis digital assistants voice technology history of technology thema EDItEUR::T Technology, Engineering, Agriculture, Industrial processes::TB Technology: general issues::TBX History of engineering and technology thema EDItEUR::P Mathematics and Science::PD Science: general issues::PDR Impact of science and technology on society |
| url | ONIX_20241025_9780262375870_86 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT bellsaraha voxexmachina |