VOICES/W4RA

Chris van Aart, Hans Akkermans, Victor de Boer, Anna Bon, Francis Dittoh, Christoph

Gueret, Nana Baah Gyan, Pieter de Leenheer, Wendelien Tuyp, Onno Wassenaar

http://vimeo.com/26520353

Digital Divide

Source: ITU Digital Access Index, World's First Global ICT Ranking

Source: African Mobile Factbook (2007) - Africa Telcom News

Voice-based services in a rural African context

• Integrate local community radios and mobile ICT for knowledge sharing

• Better support and integrate local languages in voice-based services– Development of appropriate speech elements (text-to-

speech and Speech recognition)

• Develop a free and open source toolbox for local developers.

• Investigate self-sustainability – Develop appropriate business models – In collaboration with local communities.

Context: Web For Regreening in Africa (W4RA)

“Non-timber forest products”

“Adapted Living Labs”

• Involvement of local communities– trust and ownership

• Rapid cycles– Use case gathering– Observation and prototyping– Test, adapt

• Context-specific issues– Lack of infrastructure– Illiteracy, ‘small’ language– Local ownership and maintainability– Distance between developer and user

Use Case 1

Onno Wassenaar

RadioMarche

Sahel Eco aggregates market info

Market info

Radio 1

Radio 2

Radio broadcast

French

Bambara

French

Bomu

@, www, g

sm“Communiqué”

Data management

RadioMarche.com

Generate audio communiqué(web foundation)

• Audio communiqué generated by concatenating prerecorded phrases– Each radio host uses own voice (!)

• Text-to-speech where possible

• Currently only for French

• Audio quality is an issue

Voice XML

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"?><vxml version="2.0" lang="en"> <form> <block> <prompt bargein="false"> Welcome to RadioMarche! <audio src=“audio/communique_1_bambara.wav"/> </prompt> </block> </form> </vxml>

Voxeo Prophecy VXML browser (open source)

Voice channel: Multiple solutions

Netbook running Prophecy

SIP over Ethernet

NetbookHTTP

Officeroute running Asterix

Emerginov

Netbook running Prophecy + Asterix

Bluetooth

Mobile phone

Demo!

Business model integration

Onno Wassenaar

What are we interested in?

• Data management via voice– Data presentation/UI– Voice-based browsing

• Web of Voices– ISWC Outrageous idea

• Linked data / microservers – ISWC Outrageous idea

• Integration with (development) economy

• Methodological:ICT development in rural areas – REFSQ 2012 paper– Sustainability

Mali visit 12 nov

Questions?