The next generation of voice technology
It is predicted that by 2023, the proliferation of voice assistants will have tripled, amounting to 8 billion voice assistants in use worldwide. While Amazon Alexa remains the market leader …
Course: Introduction to Conversational Interfaces
Creating technology for an inclusive future
Eventually, we can expect to have conversations with many more devices, services or platforms. The challenge is to make sure as many people can benefit from the opportunities that new …
The week ahead
Welcome to Week 2 of an introduction to conversational interfaces. Last week you learned about the basics of conversational interfaces. You learned about what they are, what they do and …
Designing ethical products and experiences
Conversational interfaces (CIs) are designed to simulate human conversation. But it’s important that people know they aren’t human and have limitations in what they can do and the way they …
Week 1: Let’s wrap up
Congratulations on making it to the end of Week 1. You have been introduced to the world of conversational interfaces and should now have a good idea of what they …
The conversational interface team
What skills and aptitudes are needed to produce a conversational interface? Here are some of those key roles and how they fit into the overall team. Some might be needed …
Voice interaction and Intelligent Personal Assistants
In the previous article we talked about intelligent personal assistants (IPAs) which are controlled by the human voice. This article will talk in more detail about these types of conversational …
The development and history of conversational interfaces
What do we mean when we talk about conversational interfaces? This article will give you some definitions and a historical overview of the development of these interfaces. Defining a conversational …
Getting ready to learn online
Learning online can be a rich and rewarding experience. You are a member of a global self-selecting community, finding out more about a topic area of your choice with like-minded …
A look at Google Duplex
Google Duplex demonstrates how voice technology can perform everyday interactions on our behalf, such as making a reservation. Let’s take a look at a demonstration of Google Duplex that debuted …
Building better conversations
As voice technology has exploded in the last five years, developers have been keen to experiment. Early on, this resulted in a swathe of poor experiences as the technology was …
The future of conversational interfaces
Our experts, Nicky Birch from the BBC and Kane Simms from VUX World, tell us what they are excited to see in the future. You will hear their insights on …
Gender, bias and stereotypes: the ethical dilemmas in voice
You read in the previous step about how Google received criticism for their Duplex product on launch because it failed to announce itself in the demonstration as a voice-activated product. …
Roles and skills
No matter how sophisticated the bot or the interface, they’ve been developed by a team of people. Perhaps you’re interested in moving into this area yourself, or perhaps you’d like …
How do voice technologies work?
There are a lot of terms and abbreviations used in technology and the field of conversational interfaces is no different. In this video, Kane Simms of VUX World takes you …