Tokyo Friendfinder
Voice-powered technology can be pretty hit and miss at the best of times, but a new approach to creating remote controls that hang on our every word looks promising.
The work comes from Oki and a Waseda University team and focuses on pulling a single target voice out of the babble of other speakers and background noise.
It relies on four microphones embedded in the front of the remote, plus “a proprietary algorithm for voice frequency analysis [that] detects talking that originates from directly in front of the device and automatically separates this out from other sounds being picked up by the microphones.”
In other words, working out who’s most likely to be the one actually giving the orders is key to getting to work on changing TV channels, dimming lights and all the rest of the voice-recognition fun.
(Via Nikkei [subscription link])
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12:08 PM 
Mark Hiratsuka •
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Audio | Home theater | Household | R&D 
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