KDnuggets: OpenAI’s Whisper API for Transcription and Translation. “This article will show you how to use OpenAI’s Whisper API to transcribe audio into text. It will also show you how to use it in your own projects and how to integrate it into your data science projects.”
Deseret News: How FamilySearch is using the future to discover the past with AI. “With the development of new artificial intelligence technology, there’s more hope of getting billions of records to families looking for information about their relatives in as little as five years. And it’s already being tested and used.”
MakeUseOf: 8 Handy Tools to Get AI-Generated Meeting Notes . “Unless you’re exceptionally good at multitasking, you might find it difficult to focus on the meeting while making complete, accurate meeting notes. In this case, it is perhaps best to concentrate on the conversation and let your AI assistant take notes. If this sounds like a good idea, read on to find about eight useful tools that can create AI-generated meeting notes.”
TechCrunch: Otter.ai launches OtterPilot, its new AI meeting assistant. “AI-powered voice transcription service Otter.ai is launching a new AI meeting assistant called OtterPilot, the company announced on Tuesday. OtterPilot automates meetings and is designed to help professionals save time and increase meeting productivity. The new features will roll out to users on all plans over the coming days, the company says.”
Boing Boing: Getting better YouTube transcripts. “YouTube provides transcripts—sort of. They’re often missing, especially on old videos, and the formatting leaves much to be desired. The cunningly-named ‘YouTube Transcripts’ website promises superior wordification.” I tried this. Blazing fast and the transcripts weren’t bad. They aren’t formatted, though, so you’ll have to do some cleanup before using them anywhere. If you struggle with understanding accented English in non-captioned YouTube videos (it me) this will be really handy. Bookmarked.
Pete Warden’s Blog: Try OpenAI’s Amazing Whisper Speech Recognition in a Free Web App. “You may have noticed that I’m obsessed with open source speech recognition, so I was very excited when OpenAI released a new voice model. I’m even more excited now I’ve had a chance to play with it, the accuracy is extremely impressive, especially as it’s multi-language. OpenAI have done a great job packaging it, you can install it straight from pip if you’re a Linux shell user, but I wanted to find a way to let anybody try it for themselves from a web browser, even if they’re not developers.”
Ars Technica: AI model from OpenAI automatically recognizes speech and translates it to English. “On Wednesday, OpenAI released a new open source AI model called Whisper that recognizes and translates audio at a level that approaches human recognition ability. It can transcribe interviews, podcasts, conversations, and more.”
KnowTechie: It’s not me, it’s you: Why I’m breaking up with Otter.ai. “Otter.ai is an automated service. Unlike other industries, it isn’t battling rampant wage inflation. The biggest variable that influences the cost-per-transaction is computing power, which is unbelievably cheap. Sure, the big three cloud providers (Microsoft, Google, and Amazon) have all recently hiked their prices in light of supply chain woes and soaring energy costs. But not by that much.”
The Verge: Find the best AI-powered app to transcribe your audio. “Whenever a popular online app announces a change to its fees, or in the services it provides for those fees, you’re going to get a reaction from its subscribers — especially the long-term ones. The latest app to cause this type of dismay is Otter, a recording and transcription service that recently announced downgrades of the services it provides on two of its plans and raised the price on a monthly plan.”
Engadget: Google adds auto-transcription and simplified grading to its education tools. “Many students have returned to in-person classes, but that isn’t stopping Google from making online education more viable. The company has updated Classroom and Workspace for Education with a host of features that improve life for teachers and students alike.”
BusinessWire: Arolsen Archives’ #everynamecounts Project Uses Artificial Intelligence to Help Uncover Information on Victims of Nazi Persecution (PRESS RELEASE). “A team of volunteers from Accenture (NYSE: ACN) has built an artificial intelligence (AI)-based solution that helps extract information on victims of Nazi persecution from documents in the Arolsen Archives 40 times faster than previous efforts.”
TheMayor: Dublin to train AI to transcribe 19-century historic records. “Today, local authorities in Dublin announced the new ‘Transcription Week’ event, which will take place between 28 March and 1 April. During the event, hundreds of volunteers will transcribe 18- and 19-century municipal documents that will later be made available to the public…. Furthermore, the work from the volunteers will be used to train an Artificial Intelligence programme, that will be used to transcribe even more documents in the future.”
MakeUseOf: How to Enable Live Captions on Clubhouse. “The wait is over. Clubhouse has finally launched a long-awaited live captions feature. If you prefer to read live captions instead of listening to audio while out in public, or if you’re deaf or hard of hearing, this feature will be especially helpful to you.”
Engadget: Otter’s transcription tech now supports Microsoft Teams, Google Meet and Webex. “Otter has a solution for that pile-up of virtual meetings in your calendar. The AI transcription tool essentially attends the gathering or conference in your place and jots down what was said. After launching with Zoom support in May, Otter is now expanding to include Microsoft Teams, Google Meet and Cisco Webex.”
CNET: Record and transcribe your Zoom meetings with this new tool, here’s how. “Zoom calls are a part of daily life for many professionals and as companies examine hybrid workplace models, that’s not likely to change anytime soon. A new tool from note-taking app Otter.ai aims to help you keep track of what happens during your Zoom meetings by automatically recording and transcribing notes so you don’t have to.”
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