In this session, we’ll continue last year’s discussion on the desirability and challenges of speech user interfaces in the car. Join us for a discussion on what we’ve learned, obstacles to user adoption, and the impact of recent media and legislative attention to the issue of distracted driving. We’ll continue our discussion on core automotive design principles with respect to prompting, balancing multiple modalities, and the impact of form factor (cell phone versus in-car solutions).

Did you ever wonder why alphanumeric recognition is so hard? Ever wonder why callers say “yes” when you ask if they want A or B? And why do text-to-speech engines mangle all of our names? The field of linguistics hold the answers to these and many other perplexing questions in voice interaction. Bring your questions and chat with two card-carrying linguists for an informal discussion of the role of linguistics in speech technology.

Join us for an informative discussion with a patent attorney on obtaining, maintaining, enforcing, and monetizing patents in the speech industry. We will discuss handling claims of patent infringement, the value of patents, and how patents can make your business more successful.

Speech technologies are widely used in call centers, telephone answering/routing systems, and, more recently, mobile devices. Where does speech go from here? Will speech be used in automated agents that guide users to debug and repair products, to help users navigate the complexity of new functions on hand-held devices, to command and control  household appliances? This out-of-the-box brainstorming session will try to identify new opportunities for speech technologies.

Language is one of the fundamental aspects of human behavior and is a crucial component of our lives. How can natural language processing (NLP) improve our interactions with computer systems and help us to better understand each other? In the past decade, there has been significant progress in many application areas of NLP, but hard problems remain. What are the current benefits and limitations of NLP? How can you determine if your applications can benefit from NLP? Join James F. Allen, Ph.D., author of the seminal book Natural Language Understanding, as he explains the state of natural language processing today and how close we are to automatic natural language understanding, summarization, translation, and information retrieval. A particular focus will be spent on the use of natural language technologies in dialogue systems.

Do we really know what customers think about speech self-service? Do the views of organizations and speech vendors match — or conflict with — the customer perspective? For organizations deploying speech solutions, alignment between these perspectives is vital in providing self-service that is not only useful, but a preferred mode of interaction. Attend this panel for a report on the latest data about how to align your speech strategy with customer opinions.

Analytics give organizations the ability to understand past and current usage of their automated self-service solutions, but can they do more? Experts in this session say “Yes!” and explore ways that you can use analytics to extrapolate from historical data to plan for the future. Attend this session to learn how your organization can benefit from advanced analytics as you set your future customer experience strategy.

Many organizations are struggling with the range of choices available when selecting a partner to implement, develop, and maintain their speech applications. This training session discusses the pros and cons of the range of possibilities, from hosted solutions to managed services and customerpremises equipment. Learn how you can sort through the different options and make the best long-term decision for your company.

Organizations are keeping tight control on resources as they navigate the recovering economy, which sometimes means hesitating to commit to new speech technology projects. Attend this informative session to learn how speech can be an affordable and valuable tool to include, even when budgets are tight. Learn how to get the most from your current technology infrastructure and methods for designing and deploying speech applications.

Personalization has become a speech industry buzzword this year, but what does it really mean for your organization? These presentations will give you valuable insight into what it takes to build a personalized interaction for customers and how to effectively plan and deliver a personalized solution. Learn how personalized interactions can help your business build interactions that increase customer delight and loyalty.

Language is one of the fundamental aspects of human behavior and is a crucial component of our lives. How can natural language processing (NLP) improve our interactions with computer systems and help us to better understand each other? In the past decade, there has been significant progress in many application areas of NLP, but hard problems remain. What are the current benefits and limitations of NLP? How can you determine if your applications can benefit from NLP? Join James F. Allen, Ph.D., author of the seminal book Natural Language Understanding, as he explains the state of natural language processing today and how close we are to automatic natural language understanding, summarization, translation, and information retrieval. A particular focus will be spent on the use of natural language technologies in dialogue systems.

The best way to create voice self-service interactions that customers are willing and able to use is to design them based on data collected from customers. In this session, you will hear results of the latest research on customer preferences and expectations for naturalness in voice interactions and how to use customer interaction data from very large deployments to inform design decisions.

Hosted speech solutions can be an attractive option for many organizations to include speech technologies in their overall self-service portfolio. This panel goes beyond financial benefits to explore ways in which hosted solutions can impact the overall customer experience as well. Come to learn panelists’ perspectives on new ways to optimize the service you provide to customers via a hosted speech solution.

Outbound IVR campaigns are gaining in popularity as organizations discover the benefits of proactive communication with customers, but organizations will not reap these benefits unless customers are receptive to outbound interactions. Join us in this session as two experts explain the factors that matter in crafting outbound messages that will be meaningful and engaging to customers.

Many organizations today face challenges of a global customer base, providing service not just for English-speaking consumers in the U.S., but for other languages and cultures. Speech technology offers the opportunity to speak with customers in their own language, but there are many pitfalls moving beyond monolingual English. Experts in this session offer guidance on sensibly designing and deploying multilingual speech solutions.

Historically, analytics have offered organizations the opportunity to gain an understanding of customer interactions in the call center. As organizations include additional communication channels, it is increasingly important to monitor their experience across all channels. Join us to learn how today’s analytics can provide a view of the experience you are providing customers across all touchpoints and how this impacts your business goals.

Language is one of the fundamental aspects of human behavior and is a crucial component of our lives. How can natural language processing (NLP) improve our interactions with computer systems and help us to better understand each other? In the past decade, there has been significant progress in many application areas of NLP, but hard problems remain. What are the current benefits and limitations of NLP? How can you determine if your applications can benefit from NLP? Join James F. Allen, Ph.D., author of the seminal book Natural Language Understanding, as he explains the state of natural language processing today and how close we are to automatic natural language understanding, summarization, translation, and information retrieval. A particular focus will be spent on the use of natural language technologies in dialogue systems.

Statistical grammars can be labor-intensitive to create: Numerous answers to the initial prompt must be captured and categorized. Changing one or more of the categories may also be labor-intensive. Is all this work worthwhile? In this panel, experts who have developed and deployed call routing systems using SMLs describe the do’s, the don’ts, and their key learnings based on their experiences.

Language is one of the fundamental aspects of human behavior and is a crucial component of our lives. How can natural language processing (NLP) improve our interactions with computer systems and help us to better understand each other? In the past decade, there has been significant progress in many application areas of NLP, but hard problems remain. What are the current benefits and limitations of NLP? How can you determine if your applications can benefit from NLP? Join James F. Allen, Ph.D., author of the seminal book Natural Language Understanding, as he explains the state of natural language processing today and how close we are to automatic natural language understanding, summarization, translation, and information retrieval. A particular focus will be spent on the use of natural language technologies in dialogue systems.

In recent years, the voice interaction design community has come together and challenged each other to raise our standards and design interfaces that are not only usable, but promote customer delight and loyalty. We invite the VUI community to weigh in on where we stand in 2010. Have we succeeded in providing better interactions? Join us for an inclusive group discussion as we review our successes and identify opportunities for further growth.

Speech technologies have moved beyond the call center and now thrive in mobile applications. Attend this session to hear two success stories. Hear how Ford Motor Co. is providing cutting-edge services to drivers via the Ford Sync system, and learn about a 511 system that uses speech and visual modalities to provide timely, location-specific information to travelers.

Designing for multimodal systems requires more than VUI design plus visual design skills. Multimodal interactions include complexities resulting from users moving between different modes of interaction for both input and output of information. Attend this session for lessons from experts who have learned from experience about the methods and guidelines that will allow you to create useful, multimodal applications.

The benefits of multimodal systems are well-known for mobile and handheld applications, but they also promise to provide easier and more appealing interactions for older users. Seniors often have limitations with memory, vision, hearing, or mobility that can make unimodal systems less effective than they are for younger users. Learn how multimodal systems can help seniors overcome these limitations and use technology to improve their lives.

For mobile and multimodal solutions to succeed, they must be built to meet the very different needs and desires of mobile users. Attend this session to hear the latest research on mobile users and how the different context of use affects what users want and expect from technology solutions. Also learn how the latest academic research informs design thinking for the design of automotive systems today.

See how users can employ speech to interact with new mobile devices — anything from starting applications to setting preferences — as well as enter and retrieve information. Experience how mobile devices power hands-free, eyes-free operation (in your car or on your factory floor); enable people to enter information without the hunt-and-peck of typing on a tiny keypad; and enable people to control their applications with intuitive voice commands instead of drop-down menus and near-invisible icons.

Organizations are relying on innovative solutions to help position themselves for recovery. Speech technology continues to evolve and the applications are reaching new dimensions. Attend this lab session to see some of the latest speech technology innovations and test drive them yourselves. Judge for yourself if these systems contribute to or distract from an organization. And judge for yourself what can be learned from innovative systems that will make other speech technologies easier to use.