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Blogovation
How Digital Trend-spotting Can Help Language Technology Roadmapping
Explore news & views on language technology (Jun 2 2013)
How does Language Technology (LT) as a sector stack up against current IT predictions for the next decade or so? The latest, and possibly most famous crystal ball gazing based on existing data is Mary Meeker’s (massive) “State of the Internet” slideshow available here .
To get a handle on some of the key trends identified for the decade ahead, Tom Kravitz at Gigaom neatly summarized them as “the next ten years will be about wearable computing and personal data”. If so, they’ll involve interesting challenges for language & speech technology. Here’s a brief take on some of these.
Big photo as stories. Meeker points out that people are sharing around 500 million photos a day, doubling the size of the global digital album each year. But can the inherent reference and knowledge in this colossal image repository be harnessed for use? Instead of depending on either the up-loader or the crowd to add encoded context to these visual objects, the semantic enrichment of photos (remember that one picture is worth a thousand words) looks like a suitable case for LT automation as Google is showing. Building up the knowledge that enables a photo to be fully tagged and hence widely searchable and usable as a source of as yet unimagined data applications will be a long process. But if it proves possible to semanticize any picture using recognition tech and automatic metadata generation, then we can link photos together and mix, match and compare them to tell better stories about the world and also about the photos themselves (one more big linked data source).
Video is data. Meeker claims the web is increasingly awash with video content, and video sharing is booming, especially short-form videos that send personal messages (video chat). Video too becomes data once it’s published and can be enriched and linked in the same way as photos. But with the added value of (often) having a spoken sound track that contains opinion and sentiments. So it will be vital to automatically tag videos to boost their searchability and linkability to other semantic eco-systems. This company offers an example of how you can tag with minimal geo-semantics today. There could also be a market for transcribing and leveraging the linguistic content of some of those video sound tracks for legal or other reasons that could benefit from a secure automated or possibly a crowdsourced solution. And in the not so distant future, the intrinsic “meaning/content” of the images themselves will be available for semantic inference in ways we can only dream about.
Wearable computing: the dress rehearsal: Kravitz suggests that the “next ten years will be about wearable computers with sensors”, following the PC decade and more recently the mobile decade. This means that personal sound files and other data generated by wearable computers will enrich the bottomless vault of potentially trackable, comparable and searchable information.
Meeker reckons fitness and health data will be a huge percentage of that personal data as more and more people “realize how behavioural shifts can improve their health and how new devices can help people track those behaviours.” One plausible accessory to make sense of the hosepipe of figures for citizens without medical training will be better data visualization.
One reasonable approach would not be simply to showcase your personal figures as a fancy diagram, but to embed the data into a story that speaks uniquely to each individual. Surely automated narratives – probably embedded in videos with a speech track - could be a powerful way to get individuals to change their habits where necessary. Whatever happens, we think that the power to transform complex data points into convincing storylines could be a winning fashion statement for wearable computer users, as in other personal data futures.
- See all Blogavation articles >>
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Older Blogovation Posts
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Hot off the (Digital) Presses: Major State-of-the-Industry Panorama of Europe’s Language Technology Sector
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Hard Data on How Europeans Use Speech Translation
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Consumers as Speech Tech Users: By the Numbers
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How Healthy is the Digital Health Startup Scene?
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When Will Spell & Grammar Checking Become an Inalienable Interface Feature?
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Why Teenage News Junkies Invent Summarisers
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Hot off the (Digital) Presses: Major State-of-the-Industry Panorama of Europe’s Language Technology Sector
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Learning Animal Languages for the Next Big Step in Communication
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LT Companies in Europe
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Eckoh Acquires Veritape
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Syllabs and Watchowah Launch Semantic Analysis Solution for Financial Marketing
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Babbel apps Crack the 10 Million Downloads Mark
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Les Echos Select TEMIS to Enrich and Link Content
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Expert System Develops Semantic Search Engine for Wolters Kluwer Italy
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Cloud Machine Translation Platform KantanMT Releases Powerful API for Members
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The Future of Mobile Keyboards
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KantanMT Introduces New Medical and Financial Domain MT Engines
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Edxus Group and IBIS Capital Announce European EdTech 20 List
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ZyLAB And Partner SDL Offer Multilingual E-Discovery Technology | The Metropolitan Corporate Counsel
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Eckoh Acquires Veritape
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Notable quotes
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“ GPUs significantly accelerate the training of our neural networks on very large amounts of data, allowing us to rapidly explore novel algorithms and training techniques. ”
By Vlad Sejnoha -
“ Businesses aren't in competition with their customers. Neither exists without the other! So for those who say – I find this bit sweet, but this bit sour, I say that's the wrong way to look at it. This is a package to benefit everyone. ”
By Neelie Kroes -
“ This generation has the guts, intelligence and awareness to tell all of us some important truths. They get that technology affects everything from equality to climate change. I really take the views of these Millennials, the digital natives, seriously, and so should smart companies and governments. ”
By Neelie Kroes -
“ Fortunately, Bitext has stepped forward with a semantic analysis engine that focuses on complementing and enriching existing systems, rather than replacing them. ”
By Stephen E. Arnold
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Language & Speech Tech Events
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The Market for Semantic Technologies Needs High-level APIs Says Daedalus
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Irish start-up Reverbeo Selected for Startup Chile Program and EU Innovator Short List
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Robot World Cup in Eindhoven Expects 2500 Contestants from 40 Countries
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Berlin Buzzwords June 3-4 2013: Search, Store & Scale
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4 Europeans in 'Top Semantic Technology Start-Up' Competition
- See all Events & Awards articles >>
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The Market for Semantic Technologies Needs High-level APIs Says Daedalus
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Categories
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Technologies:
AI,
Analytics,
Annotation,
Controlled Language,
Information Retrieval,
Lab-to-Market,
Language Resources,
Machine Learning,
Machine Translation,
NLP,
OCR,
Open Data,
Semantic Technology,
Speech Biometrics,
Speech Input,
Speech Output,
Taxonomy/Ontology,
Translation Platform
Applications: Ad Optimisation, Augmented Reality, Authoring, Big Data, Brand Management, Business Intelligence, Captioning/Dubbing/Subtitling, Change Management, Compliance/Risk Management, Concept Mining, Content Generation, Content Virtualisation, Content/Asset Management, CRM, Decision Support, Discovery Engine, EMR/EHR, Enterprise Collaboration, Enterprise Search, eReaders, Information Extraction, Information Management, Internet of Things, Interpreting, IVR, Knowledge Management, Language Identification, Language Learning, Localisation, Mobile Apps, Mobile Search, Multilingual Chat, Multilingual Search, Multimedia Search, Navigation, Office Productivity, Performance Monitoring, Procurement, Publishing, Recommender, Recording/Transcription, Robotics, Sentiment Detection, SEO, Sign Language, Smart Grid, Smart/Integrated TV, Social Media, Social Search, Speech Analytics, Spoken Search, Summarisation, Talent Management, Telematics, Terminology Management, Text Analytics, Text Input, Text Mining, Translation, Translation Management, Unified Communications, Verification/Identity, Virtual Assistant, Voice Clones, Voice Portals, Voice Search, Voice UI, Web Search, Workforce Optimisation
Industries: Advertising, Aerospace, Agriculture, Automotive/Vehicles, Broadcasting, Consumer Electronics, Contact Centre, Distribution/Warehouse, eCommerce, Education/Training, Energy/Utilities, Entertainment/Music/Gaming, Financial Services, Government/Security, Hospitality, Internet/Media, Language Products/Services, Legal, Life Sciences/Healthcare, Manufacturing, Non-Profit, Retail, Telecommunications, Travel/Transportation
Topics: Association, Case Study/White Paper, Cloud Computing, Crowdsourcing, Digital Agenda, Entrepreneurship, Events & Awards, Innovation, Language Barrier, ltba, Market Size/Share, Open Source, Patents/IPR, People on the Move, Product Launch, Public Policy, ROI, SMB/SME, Standards, Startups/Spinoffs, Survey/Report, Videos
Investment & Finance: Cluster/Accelerator, Crowdfunding, Earnings, IPO, M&A, Public Funding, Venture Capital
Newsletter Categories: Innovation & Ventures, Intelligent Content Technology, Market Research Data, News Roundup, Speech Technology, Translation Technology
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LT in Europe
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SDL's Share Price Falls as Earnings Outlook is Halved
Explore City A.M. (7 hours, 51 min ago) Language Products/Services , Earnings
TRANSLATION software firm SDL saw its share price plunge nearly 30% yesterday after slashing its full-year profit guidance. Pre-tax profits are now expected to be within the range of £15m-£20m in 2013, down from £35.5m in 2012. Analysts had forecast a profit of around £30m this year.
(Read Full Article)
Comment Mentions: SDL (UK) Mark Lancaster
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EU MyHealthAvatars Track Your Lifetime Health Profile
Explore iSGTW (19 hours, 17 min ago) Content/Asset Management , Life Sciences/Healthcare , Digital Agenda
The MyHealthAvatar project is testing the idea of a Europe-wide network of health avatars for each individual citizen. Rather than being a virtual holographic friend, each avatar will be a web-based data depository containing a full record of that individual’s health status.
(Read Full Article)
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Swedish Teledermatology Service iDoc24 Launches On Android
Explore ArcticStartup (23 hours, 58 min ago) Mobile Apps , Life Sciences/Healthcare
Sweden-based iDoc24 (a teledermatology startup) offers skin care apps now on Android. The products provide a screening tool which gives better key words to search than Google and in fact connects users with real experts in dermatology.
(Read Full Article)
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Fragmented Telecoms Market will Hold Back 4G and Broadband Growth in Europe
Explore The Next Web (Jun 17 2013) Telecommunications , Digital Agenda
Vice President of the European Commission and Digital Agenda Commissioner Neelie Kroes: Keeping pace with broadband and 4G LTE developments will be a near impossibility if Europe maintains a system of fragmented telecoms markets and providers, according to the .
(Read Full Article)
Comment Mentions: Europe Brussels Neelie Kroes
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Concept Searching Partners with Collabware
Explore Press Release Distribution (Jun 17 2013) Analytics , Taxonomy/Ontology , Content Generation , CRM , Text Analytics
UK-based Concept Searching (semantic metadata generation, auto-classification, and taxonomy management software) is partnering with Collabware, which offers records managers a comprehensive content lifecycle management product for Microsoft SharePoint.
(Read Full Article)
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Video on How UK Govenment Has Gone Open Digital
Explore guardian.co.uk (Jun 15 2013) Open Data , Government/Security , Digital Agenda
An elite team of digital experts has sparked a radical shake-up in the way the UK government does its business. Some of the country's best designers and developers are working on building a new single website for all government departments – gov.uk – but their influence has gone much further.
(Read Full Article)
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Britain Launches National 'Information Economy' Strategy
Explore InformationWeek (Jun 14 2013) Big Data , Education/Training , Government/Security , Cloud Computing
The UK government has announced a broad set of initiatives to promote the success of the U.K. information economy. The Information Economy Strategy will a build a "strong, innovative information economy sector exporting U.K. excellence to the world," as well ensuring the country's citizens benefit from the digital age. Goals include encouraging young people, especially girls, to pursue careers in technology, and seizing opportunities presented by massive open online courses (MOOCs).
(Read Full Article)
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SAP Releases Predictive Analytics Updates
Explore SAP Newsroom (Jun 14 2013) Analytics , Big Data , Business Intelligence
SAP has released updates to predictive analytics software that empower everyone — from sophisticated statisticians to business users — with predictive insight. Version 1.0.11 of SAP Predictive Analysis software offers more flexible modeling and performance, which can help users uncover new opportunities from big data in real time.
(Read Full Article)
- See all articles >>
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LT Industry News
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SAP Survey Shows Insurance Executives Target Integrated Platform to Upgrade Their Business
Explore SAP Newsroom (0 min ago) Analytics , Financial Services , Market Research Data
Insurers believe that analytics is the No. 1 key to gaining competitive advantage. 43% of the respondents believed that advanced analytics for greater insight into the business, including predictive and fraud management, are essential for them to differentiate themselves.
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Google Officially Launches Knowledge Graph Carousel For Local Search
Explore Search Engine Land (15 hours, 52 min ago) Controlled Language , Web Search , Internet/Media , Intelligent Content Technology
When a user searches for “restaurants, bars or other local places” from their desktop, they will get the horizontal Carousel display of images against a black background at the top of their SERP.
(Read Full Article) -
GPU-based Neural Network Cleverer than Google's
Explore Engineering and Technology magazine (17 hours, 45 min ago) AI , Machine Learning , Speech Input , Innovation & Ventures
The graphic-processing unit based (GPU) network built by the graphic-processing unit manufacturer NVIDIA and Stanford University researchers promises a breakthrough in machine learning. The creators believe it will be able to learn how to recognise objects, characters and voices 'almost' in the same way as humans.
(Read Full Article)Comment Mentions: Germany Hamburg Vlad Sejnoha
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Expect Labs Anticipatory Computing Engine to Become Platform
Explore blogs.computerworlduk.com (17 hours, 56 min ago) Lab-to-Market , Speech Input , Big Data , Speech Technology
Expect Labs built the application MindMeld to make the conversations people have with one another 'easier and more productive” by integrating voice recognition with an intelligent assistant on an intuitive tablet application. Their term “Anticipatory Computing Engine” describes a new kind of collaboration environment.
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Anki Creates Truly Intelligent Robot Toys
Explore RobotShop (20 hours, 20 min ago) AI , Robotics , Consumer Electronics , Innovation & Ventures
Anki is launching Anki DRIVE, a physical gaming platform that uses artificial intelligence with real-world robotic toy cars. Not only can the robots drive themselves, but they can also be used to play sophisticated games.
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Yandex Launches .Browser On iOS And Android
Explore TechCrunch (21 hours, 28 min ago) Speech Input , Speech Technology
Yandex has unveiled another service that will give it a stronger foothold in the fast-growing mobile market: a dedicated mobile browser, which will feature a single box for URLs and searches, voice recognition features and more. But Yandex is still stopping short of launching a full-blown, Android-style mobile platform to complete the picture.
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Rubidium Releases Dutch ASR and TTS Package
Explore Digital Journal (Jun 18 2013) Speech Biometrics , Speech Input , Voice UI , Speech Technology
Israel-based Rubidium Ltd., a global supplier of embedded speech processing technologies, has released its integrated Voice User Interface engine for the Dutch language, encapsulating Automatic Speech Recognition, hands-free Voice Trigger, Text-to-Speech and playback of Compressed Speech Prompts.
(Read Full Article)Comment Mentions: Netherlands Belgium Amsterdam
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Deep Learning Systems Could Cost Much Less says A. Ng
Explore The Register (Jun 17 2013) AI , Lab-to-Market , Machine Learning , Speech Input , Innovation & Ventures
In a paper published this week entitled Deep learning with COTS HPC system, Andrew Ng, the director for Stanford University's Artificial Intelligence Lab and former visiting scholar at "Google X", and his colleagues detail how they have created a much cheaper system for running deep-learning algorithms at scale.
(Read Full Article) - See more articles >>
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