Anyone using Dragon Naturally Speaking or any other speech to text tool?

Well, the good news is that yes, DNS makes content creation go by a lot faster.

The bad news is that even with a seamless natural accent it's not perfect, and you'll still have to go back through and edit everything and make sure punctuation etc is as you'd like it to be. It takes some getting used to, and it'll take it a couple weeks of consistent usage for it to 'learn' your voice. I believe they actually do have a non-native profile setting built in (It asks you your accent when you're setting it up).

It's really handy, and I do recommend you try it out if you think it'd help. I'm a fast typist, so it doesn't really save time for me, but it does give my hands a huge break for carpal tunnel.

Anyways, I hope that helps. If you're using a computer with Windows 7 there's a speech recognition program built in that's actually not half bad...May be worth checking out. Dragon is far superior, though.

Kindly,
- Stephen

Dragon Naturally Speaking has been one of the
best investments in my online business I have
ever made.

It saves me an amzing amount of time. I can
"write" emails, blog posts, ebooks and even
forum posts much more quickly with Dragon
Naturally Speaking than with keyboard pecking!

You need to be prepared to invest time with
Dragon Naturally Speaking to train the system
to recognise your voice... the more time you
put into the training phase the more accurate
your output will be.

John

As a writer I use Dragon Naturally Speaking a lot for doing first drafts. I have been able to punch out upward of 1500 words and hour using this program. It was previously mentioned that while you can get a lot of work done, it requires heavy editing to make sure it is correct. It also requires time for the software to adapt to your voice, accents and speaking patterns.

The software learns quickly and if you take the time to train the software as suggested, and let it scan the documents and emails on your computer it will pick up the patterns of your speech and writing that much faster. Dragon Naturally Speaking is a tool. Learn to use it properly and it will do wonders for you.

By the way, I have been told that at times I have a rather strong Southern Accent and the software works very well for me.

David

I really like it, I just upgraded to version 11 and its a lot better than 10. Like everyone says, you do have to go back and correct but its great for first drafts.

I've used it quite a lot, it's a great tool and I think it could suite you fine if you are a better speaker than writer

Yes I have a "foreign" accent - Orstrayan - and yes I use DNS - the Mac version "Dragon Dictate".

Its excellent for getting a natural conversational style to your copywriting. Not only that - I had Carpal Tunnel Surgery on my right hand early this year and couldn't type while it healed. So the Dragon came to the rescue. You can also walk around your office as you dictate - either with a long lead connection or a cordless Bluetooth connection.

It does take a while to get used to your accent but gets better and better. For instance, at first, every time I said "Australian" it would type "Austrian". But after I punched it a few times it soon sorted itself out. ;-)

http://www.warriorforum.com/off-topi...ng-appeal.html

I use Dragon coming up on two years now....LOVE IT!

I just am not a good typist, so it's essential for me to turn out
work quickly - once trained Dragon is remarkably accurate.

I will say an accent may require some additional training, though.
_____
Bruce

I have it and agree that it takes a while to train the program. I am unfortunate enough to have a Boston accent and it took a while for me to get the hang of it. It's really cool once you do though. Just speak and look it over briefly to edit and you're good to go.

Someone commented that he managed to get his windows speech recognition software working well by sending himself an email on the subject he wanted to talk about, and then replying to that. The software knew what he was talking about from the email.

I thought it was a brilliant idea, both on the part of the software and the person. It would probably work with DNS too.

I use DNS every day and I have to say it really is a time saver. The freedom to just 'freewheel' on a topic and basically get upwards of several thousand words an hour is something I can utilise without a second thought.

That being said as mentioned above you need to be aware of 2 things: First off you will need to baby sit it in the learning stages while it builds up your user profile and learns how you pronounce words etc. This means inevitably there will be some times where you need to edit the document created. I manually edit as I go through a document if its important and recheck every paragraph after a document is created.

Secondly I think it would pay to invest in a 'good' headset because the quality of the mic will definitely have an impact on how well you get along with DNS. I upgraded from a cheap mic during the testing stages and never looked back, it pays off in quick time.

I have a british accent and with a bit of training I dont feel DNS will be a problem unless you have a very thick accent. You need to pronounce everything clearly. If anything DNS has helped me by not falling into slang and actually clearly pronouncing my sentences, so it works to improve your overall verbiage.

In short DNS is a big time saver once you get it all set up and the best thing is it keeps learning so the more you use it the better it gets. I am now at the stage where I find myself doing much less by way of editing since it seems to understand me very well. Its also still quite cool seeing a stream of my speech actually being converted into words in real time on the screen.....now I just need more thoughts to put down in words ;-) Good luck whatever you decide to do!

I use DNS and it's fantastic. Like everyone said it does take some time. I have a bit of an accent being from the Northeast US, but it works fine and learns as you go. I am able to put out copy and write papers/documents, much fast than typing.

My experience with it sucked.
I am a recovering stroke patient that went out and purchased the original model.
I tried and tried but it was a huge waste of time and money for me.
That was back in 2000.
I wish you the best,but if you have anything other than a plain American accent(I
am from the south),then I am sure you will feel ripped off to.
At least the price is down to half what they ripped me off for.

Here is one of my little SEO secrets... I'm using speach-to-text software to generate unique content. Why pay for articles if you can generate them for free?

I would give Dragon Naturally speaking a try, once you get used to the system and the more you use it, the easier it becomes. I use it on my laptop, the only problem that I have found is that if your computer is updating or the hard disc is doing something, it does not respond properly, although I think this could be down to my laptop getting older, possibly!

I am finding more and more lately that I am using DNS to get through the initial development of an article very quickly. I then expand the article to nearly 200% view so that it fills the screen with just a few lines of text.

I then go through the text letter by letter reading out loud, Let me say that again, OUT LOUD. By reading it out loud you can hear how it sounds and whether it actually makes sense.

Final editing is by done by reading backwards word by word. It takes some practice but you mind will actually edit your work very quickly and you will pick up spelling and grammar mistakes very fast.

David

DNS is a great program. I had a few issues when I switched
computers though.

My old 32-bit Dell worked great with the older DNS program.
I was able to use the microphone that came with the program
and was very pleased with it.

I upgraded a year later and got a new computer that was
running Windows 7. I had to purchase the 64-bit version and
bought DNS 10.0. Immediately I had issues using the headphone
and mic combo that came with it.

I kept getting errors with the set-up. It seems the headphone and
mic combo that came with the program were not good enough, at
least on the newer version.

I ended up using a Plantronics USB headset to set things up. The
dictation from that point was spot on, much like the older version
that I used.

DNS works great if you know the subject matter, but can be a pain
if you don't.

Overall I am a big fan of DNS, and am sure you can see from the
amount of replies to your original post that many others are as well.

Mac or PC version seem to have good reviews, but I attempted the iPhone App version, and not accurate at this stage.

I tried this tool and didn't like it.

It is not a perfect tool. I have to manually go back and do the editing each time Dragon spell it wrongly. After awhile, I am better off writing myself. Maybe my voice and pronunciation does not go down well with Dragon and you might have better luck than me.

I have DNS and it is handy to rest my hands. I have severe neck pain and sometimes it is so bad that DNS proves to be a lifesaver. But you do need to edit it more than if you simply wrote something. IT does take training but it really boils down to whether you want to use it or just type.

The message below was sent to a WF member 'by me' that was having a problem trying to speak normally in DNS. I thought I would share it in case someone else was having the same problem.
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Dragon software is very unique in the sense that if you can talk, it will work for you. The problem is not with the thought process, but rather finding it difficult to talk and watch our words appear on screen. Training is not a problem because it's simply using the pre-installed training programs to accomplish this.

However, once you have the software up and running, sometimes you will find it difficult actually talking through a complete article. If you do, it's not a matter of training the software; it's a matter of training yourself. To train yourself effectively, you will need to practice talking with your headset on. First, think of a story you would like to tell.

Something you can talk about for hours. Maybe something that happened in your past that you can talk about for at least 500 to 800 words. First do it while looking at the screen (don't worry about mistakes), then do it with your back to your screen. Each time you do it, ask yourself which felt better. Looking at the screen, or when you had your back to it.

Once you have decided which is better (normally when you aren't looking at the screen) you can then begin to work on the finer points 'i.e. vocabulary, grammar, and punctuation'. Take your time because you will eventually train yourself to be a pro. Training it in this way will make a difference.

If you are interested in more information about dragon software, post your replies here, and I will try and provide some insight.

I also have other posts on the WF about DNS, so you can search those out as well.

It's useful if you put the time into training it.

But really, if you practice typing enough you can type faster than it can dictate.