Listen to Webx0 podcasts

As you may have noticed, I'm testing a new widget from a company called Odiogo on this blog.

The Odiogo widget adds a small "Listen now" button right under the title of each post ---->

After clicking that button, a slider will open with a mini player so you can immediately listen to a podcast of that post. You also have an option to subscribe to the Webx0 podcast feed on your iTunes.

I'm really interested in your feedback on this widget (which I will share with the Odiogo guys). Do you find this service useful? How did it perform for you? What do you think about the implementation on the blog? 

Any feedback would be appreciated! Use the comments below or shoot me an email to yaron at galai dot com.

Comments

[Rogel]

You asked for it, so ...
I personally not a big fun of podcasts, specially not when I have option to read the text. But while the execution of odiogo isn't bad it is yet far from human reading - it is still too metallic and it has problem with the expressing the sentences the way human would.

[Yaron Galai]

Thanks Rogel. I agree the voice is not yet human enough for real comfortable listening. I think the Odiogo guys are constantly working on that... Marc, Patrice - feel free to chime in.

[Marc]

Rogel, Yaron,

Thanks for your comments. Two issues are being raised: Odiogo output quality and relevance of vocalization of text-content.

Text to speech has made immense progress over the last years. This trend will persist: soon artificial intelligence algorithms will allow digging into the semantics of the content and adapt consequently tone, prosody and other vocal parameters. Content coloring through voice variations, short gingles and other will help make an even more compelling result. The tens of thousands of downloads we experience weekly on our platform encourage us to pursue our development.

Our play is in the 'media shifting space' where content created for one medium is made available for consumption via many mediums. Or, in other words, 'write once, consume on many'. Our vocalization solution is targeted to users who are in 'eye free' situations: drivers, travelers, joggers, mutlitaskers, etc. who want to consume content while conducting another activity. Not to forget the accessibility improvement it brings to vision impaired communities and language learners.

We do not pretend to substitute to professional speakers but rather provide an economically viable, high quality output, which brings a solution to a problem.

[Jeff]

It worked better than I would have expected. I listened to the free ad space post and it worked great, although the acronyms were simply spelled out (IMHO,NY, btw).

On a side note, the name is very similar to ODEO - might strengthen the brand if it had a more unique name (4 syllables in a 6 character name - wow).

Probably more feedback than you were looking for :)

[Jean-Marie Gall]

Bonjour,
Je viens de m'inscrire et cela ne fonctionne pas ce qui est normal, puisque Odiogo n'est pas encore en mesure de traiter les blogs français, enfin, j'ai quand même contacter le support d'Odiogo et ils m'ont répondus en français qu'ils allaient bientôt pouvoir traiter les blogs français, ce qui est une bonne nouvelles.
Leurs service de podcast audio est super et gratuit en plus, c'est le top ...
J'ai découvert ce service sur ce blog ...;-))