Now Speak Your Texts: Dragon Dictation Appears On The iPhone

Eli Milchman ()

Dec82009308PM2 Dec82009308PM1

Dragon Dictation is a cool, free little app that allows you to write emails or text messages just by talking into your iPhone, because it transmogrifies your speech into text. In fact, I’m using it to write this.

Well, sorta. As documented by the above-left screenshot, even with the most pristine elocution I could muster, the results provided by Dragon Dictation still left me with errors to clean up. The above-right shot is what happened when I spoke with my everyday, habitually clipped delivery.

So, perhaps not the best solution for popping out a quick text on the road, but a good option to quickly get text down in words that you can straighten out later. Because Dragon Dictation is service-based, connection via wifi or 3G (i wasn’t able to test it using EDGE) is required. And right now Dragon Dictation is free, making it easy to take out for a test spin.

DON'T MISS
Dragon Express Brings Siri-Like Speech-To-Text To Your Mac

PC users (yes, PC users read Cult of Mac) might correctly identify Dragon as the same engine that powers Dragon NaturallySpeaking, the impressive speech-to-text PC app (and MacSpeech Dictate, a similar app for the rest of us).

15 comments »

About the author

Eli Milchman

When he was eight, Eli Milchman came home from frolicking in the Veld one day and was given an Atari 400. Since then, his fascination with technology has made him an intrepid early adopter of whatever charming new contraption crosses his path — which explains why he's Cult of Mac's technology editor. He calls San Francisco home, where he works as a journalist and photographer. Eli has contributed to the pages of Wired.com and BIKE Magazine, among others. Hang with him on Twitter.

(sorry, you need Javascript to see this e-mail address)| Read more posts by .

Posted in iPhone, News |

  • http://twitter.com/nicksmale Nick Smale

    I think this is only available overseas – it doesn’t appear to be on the UK iTunes Store yet.

  • http://cheriegate.org William Cheriegate

    Works very nice, try it out, really worth it.

    B-e-a-u-t-y.

  • http://cheriegate.org William Cheriegate

    By the way, I finished reading the article and 120 seconds later I was sending my first one out from my iPhone. Bang !

  • Mitchell Preston

    After reading the reviews on the app store, it seems this app uploads your contact info to their servers. Caveat emptor.

  • Shane

    I really love the idea of a speech-to-text utility for the phone, but there one major drawback that this had that I didn’t like was: it says that it’s going to upload the contents of your contacts/address book. That’s a ridiculous need on the part of a program like this, and as such, isn’t going to get any time on my iPhone.

    Granted, I’m not Tiger Woods, but there are few, if any reasons, I can imagine they’d need access to store, read, and sell that information… info that my friends and family and coworkers (etc) have entrusted me with in keeping. Too bad more people didn’t read what they were agreeing to when they loaded it today…

  • http://www.grinningidiot.com JAYnLA

    Shane — what are you talking about? Where does it say that it will ‘upload’ your entire address book? It will access it, yes. Upload? I doubt it.

  • http://www.grinningidiot.com JAYnLA

    As I thought — they only record the NAME of the person you’re sending a message to. No personal contact info. Here’s what it says:

    “We understand our users’ privacy rights and concerns and assure you that data uploaded through our Dragon Dictation application will not be used in any way aside from enhancing your experience with the application. Dragon Dictation application does upload a user’s contact names only (no phone numbers, email addresses, etc.) The data is used to optimize recognition when a user speaks a name while dictating text messages and emails. Search queries and dictation requests are transcribed by fully automated speech recognition software, without the use of humans. We ensure data integrity and security. All speech recognition requests and associated data are processed in data centers in the U.S. that adhere to stringent security and privacy standards; these are the same standards that we use for processing sensitive information in other areas of our business. “

  • JNL

    “This app is incompatible with this iPod Touch. This app works only with iPhone.” Why? I have a mic on the iPod’s earbuds. I can use Voice Memos with this. Evernote lets me record voice notes. Bad Dragon app!

  • Shane

    JAYnLA – You can doubt it all you want, but I don’t see how they’d collect information without uploading it. Aside from that notion, they say exactly that on their blog: “Dragon Dictation for the iPhone goes through your contact list on your iPhone and uploads the names to our server.”

    Now, I know this company has been around for a while and has been working on software like this for a long time, so that affords them some benefit of the doubt here, but still… c’mon.

    The decision to go through my contacts/address book to better help their program recognize names for translation is legit sounding. But, they couldn’t have come up with something else? Surely there are databases of names they could have cut-n-pasted in to avoid having to go through my info to get a handle on the name “Steve”? Why not set it up like this: have an option to type in a word, hit a button, speak that word, and have it try to learn words that give it trouble like that? Hell, if instead of going into my contacts they offered that option, I’d *easily* drop 5-7$ for the app.

    Bottom line is: I’m sure they’re legit. I’m sure it’s safe. I’m also sure it’s too late, because most people don’t really read the agreements, they just want to push “accept” as fast as they can (I’ve done it, too). But, I see very few reasons to let them into my contacts for this, when there are clearly other options. If you don’t have anything in your contacts that is sensitive in any way, then there’s no reason to share that feeling with me. I can appreciate that.

  • http://www.grinningidiot.com JAYnLA

    Hey Shane –

    The important nuance of difference between your concern and what they actually do lies in the word ‘contacts’.

    They send up the name, so that it can be better recognized when you speak it later. They don’t send up any of the ‘contact’ information. The hysteria in the app’s review section on the App Store is all based on this misconception.

    They DO NOT store any CONTACT INFORMATION. A name is not contact info.

  • Shane

    JAYnLA,

    Hi, back. Look, I know what you’re saying — really, I do. I promise I’m not sitting here with a tinfoil hat upon my head, scouring Area51 websites for The Truth. My major point of contention was — the act of getting what they wanted (assistance with using their software) could be just as easily gotten without having to do what they felt was necessary in their programming. That’s it, really. Paying someone a minimum wage to type in a database of names like James, Jeffery, John, etc. would be much more appreciated and welcome than feeling it necessary to do anything to my contact list, up to, and including, admitting to me you’re going through it and uploading it to a server. Suggestions like the ones I made above, for example…

    I read, with a lot of amusement, the people freaking out on the app’s iTunes page. You’re right in labeling it hysteria, man… it’s kinda funny to see people freaking out about it so much. I mean, I know the data is probably out there en masse already, but that’s exactly my point, you know? That’s all. For what they say they wanted to do, there was other, easier, ways to accomplish it in my opinion.

    It’s been good to talk it out!

  • Belenus

    yes, im one of those PC user who reads Cult of Mac a few times in a week, being a PC user is not a personal choice always though!!

  • Belen

    btw just realised that it s not available UK iphones , sadly :(

  • anon

    Uploading contact information is only a small concern. They upload your actual speech data to their servers and transcribe it there and store the transcription data (i.e. words you use when you speak) in a personalized profile created for you, in order to have their algorithm “learn” and improve accuracy. Yes, they create an anonymous profile with no relation to your name/number, but it is still tied to the UID of your device and so your stored speech and transcription data can always be traced back to you, which is why they also state that if needed, they will provide all this data to law enforcement etc. Of course, pundits say so will Google, Microsoft, Apple etc., however we also do know that the NSA (read “Patriot Act” etc.) has requested and recieved search data from Microsoft in the past on request (“to help fight the war on terror” etc.). And so who knows if the NSA will also ask a company like Nuance for people’s voice data to spy on people.

  • Jason

    Here are two ways to enjoy the app without worrying about your privacy.

    1) Don’t dictate your terrorist plots or illicit plans with this app.
    2) You have the option to let them use your contact names. At least I had the option. I simply said no thanks, and that was that.

    Once your comfortable with that, it’s a great app for texting (when hands are otherwise busy) and composing emails. Not to mention that you can dictate emoticons and punctuation. Simply say “smiley” and get :-) or “exclamation point” and get ! It’s rather nice once you get the hang of it, and it seems to get better the more I use it.