A funny thing happened today − I left a voicemail for one of our technology partners. The message wasn't humorous at all; however, the way it was captured and then displayed to its intended recipient turned into a modern day game of telephone.

The message was captured by our partner’s Voice Mail Preview system, which is offered within Outlook 2010 and Outlook Web App. The system is powered by Microsoft Speech Technologies and is intended to provide a clean translation of a voice mail directly into email.

The technology is still in its infancy and can be seen in its raw translated form in the email below, which was passed along to me by our partner.

Voice Mail Preview:

Hey Bob,

Not Ryan malts brat Ferndale hey thanks for goodness back so quickly pretty well helping us most but but but your slower there out on the.

Central a part of the country so -- .

Moving with thanks that's all but pretty wild he is a lock this and outlook so I can give me a shout when you get a cup message we'll talk about next steps and we can move pretty quickly get this thing up for you.

Alright thanks.

I'm pretty sure that I don't speak German and haven't spoken Spanish in over 10 years, so what did I actually say? 

The Actual Message:

Hi Bob,

It’s Ryan Moltenbrey at Verndale returning your message. Thanks for getting back to me so quickly as I thought you folks in the middle of the country worked at a slower pace!

We are moving ahead of schedule and looks like we'll have a pretty good chance to have the hosting infrastructure set up by the end of day tomorrow.  Please give me a shout when you have a moment and I can update you on the progress.

Alright, thanks.

Ryan 

The moral of the story is that the next time you leave a message and hear that it is being delivered by MS Voice Mail Preview, Google Voice or any other translated service you may want to think twice. Or, just make sure to speak extremely clear and very slow.

Voice recognition software kits do typically come with a microphone and training materials normally used to familiarize the software with the user’s voice. It is strongly recommended to read the script multiple times in order to increase the accuracy of the software. If the product is not familiar with the user’s speech patterns and enunciation, then the message is unlikely to come out clear, depending on the quality of your voice recognition package.

Learn more about Microsoft Speech Technologies as this is a fast growing segment in the technology landscape.