YouTube Has Speech-to-Text Functionality.....and it Works

YouTube has introduced rich metadata into select videos, which will significantly impact how online video is discovered and consumed. 

Announced in June, we have found the technology is very useful.  Last week, we got an update on this from Steve Grove, head of news and politics at YouTube.

YouTube applies a technology in which automated spiders "listen" and transcribe the words in the audio track of a video.  This transcription, in the form of metadata, is embedded into the video.   

This new speech-to-text technology has been applied to campaign videos from John McCain and Barack Obama as well as non-campaign produced clips.  The search box is found on YouTube You Choose page.  (It's on the lower left area of the page.) Visitors can enter words such as "Iraq, "Global Warming," and "Free Trade."  Also, putting your cursor over the timeline, you can see the transcription.

While this is the first voice-to-text speech application at YouTube and will likely expand, this is an emerging area in video search.  Companies including Blinkx, EveryZing and Delve are providing voice-to-text transcriptions in the form of metadata.

Later this year, Adobe, will provide speech-to-text technology into the Flash video production environment, Beet.TV has learned.  This is a critically important development in bringing effective search to online video.

I interviewed Steve at Stanford last week where he was a panelist on the Beet.TV online video roundtable.

Here's story about YouTube and the new voice-to-text features by Anthony Ha at Venture Beat.

McCain's Obama Celebrity Video is Blockbuster on YouTube

Uploaded to YouTube less than 24 hours ago, the McCain campaign ad about Obama's "celebrity" status, comparing him with Britney Spears and Paris Hilton, has had 750,000 views at this  hour.

-- Andy Plesser, Executive Producer