G: Sure , sure , sure .
H: British is English ?
B: Why ?
G: Yeah . Different varieties of English .
C: Ooo , ooo .
B: Well , I don't I don't I don't think if he didn't say that G: Native speaking . Native speaking English .
H: I bet he meant native speaking American .
G: Yes .
B: I bet he did .
C: American English ?
G: Oh , really .
H: So , why would he care ?
E: Knowing the application B: I remember wh I I remember a study A: That 's A: I was thinking , knowing the , uh , n National Institute of Standards , it is all B: I remember a study that BBN did where they trained on B: this was in Wall Street Journal days or something ,
B: they trained on American English
B: and then they tested on , uh , different native speakers from different areas .
B: And , uh ,
B: uh , the worst match was people whose native tongue was Mandarin Chinese .
B: The second worst was British English .
G: That 's funny .
B: So h it 's , you know , t
G: Alright .
G: And so that would make sense .
B: the the the German was much better ,
G: I didn't have the context of that .
C: Ooo , ooo .
B: it was Swiss w
B: Yeah , so it 's B: so I think , you know , if he 's if he 's thinking in terms of recognition kind of technology I I I think he would probably want , uh American English ,
H: I wonder if we have any .
G: All America , OK .
B: yeah .
B: It it yeah , unless we 're gonna train with a whole bunch of G: I think that the Feldman 's meetings tend to be more that way ,
G: aren't they ?
G: I mean , I sort of feel like they have H: Maybe .
B: I think so ,
H: Maybe .
B: yeah .
A: Yeah ,
A: mm - hmm .
B: Yeah .
D: Mmm .
H: And maybe there are a few of with us where it was H: you know , Dan wasn't there
B: Yeah .
H: and before Jose started coming ,
B: Yeah .
D: Yeah .
H: and B: It 's pretty tough , uh , this group . Yeah .
H: Yeah .
C: Mmm .
D: Yeah .
B: So , uh , what about what about people who involved in some artistic endeavor ?
B: I mean , film - making or something like that .
A: Exactly , that 's what I was B: You 'd think like they would be D: A film - maker .
A: something where there there is actually discussion where there 's no right or wrong answer but but it 's a matter of opinion kind of thing .
G: It 's be fun .
A: Uh , anyway , if you if you have ideas H: RASTA . PLP .
H: RASTA . PLP .
F: We can just discu we can just have a political discussion one day .
D: Yes .
E: A any department that calls itself science
A: Yeah , we could D: Department .
F: Uh , I could make that pretty H: Well , like computer science .
D: Yeah .
H: That D: Computer sci
G: We could get Julia Child .
G: I know .
H: That 's A: I 'm I 'm actually serious
H: Got a ticket .
A: because , uh , you know , we have the set up here
B: Yeah , I know you are .
A: and and that that has a chance to give us some very interesting fun data .
A: So
A: if anyone has ideas ,
D: Yeah .
B: Yeah .
A: if you know any groups that are m you know ,
H: Well I had asked some some of the students at the business school .
D: Yeah .
F: I know A: student groups c like clubs , things like that .
H: I could B: Put a little ad up saying , " come here and argue " .
A: Not not A: Yeah .
H: The Business school .
A: " If you 're really angry at someone use our conference room . "
H: Uh , the business school might be good .
H: I actually spoke with some students up there
A: Oh , OK .
H: and they they they expressed willingness back when they thought they would be doing more stuff with speech .
A: Really .
H: But when they lost interest in speech they also stopped answering my email about other stuff ,
H: so .
D: Hmm .
F: I B: They could have a discussion about te
A: Or people who are really h
H: We should probably bleep that out .
B: about about tax cuts or something .
F: I heard that at Cal Tech they have a special room F: someone said that they had a special room to get all your frustrations out
F: that you can go to and like throw things and break things .
F: So we can like post a B: Yeah , now that is not actually what we H: Th - that 's not what we want .
F: No , not to that extent
F: but , um .
A: Well , far field mikes can pick up where they threw stuff on the wall .
F: Yeah .
B: Yeah , but we don't want them to throw the far field mikes is the thing .
H: That 's right .
A: Oh . Yeah , right .
F: Yeah .
D: The fa
H: " Please throw everything in that direction . "
B: Yeah . Anyway .
H: Padded cell .
G: It 'd be fun to get like a a p visit from the H: There was a dorm room at Tech that , uh , someone had coated the walls and the ceiling , and , uh , the floor with mattresses .
F: Mmm .
H: The entire room .
B: I had as my fourth thing here processing of wave forms .
G: Yeah .
B: What did we mean by that ?
H: Uh , Liz wanted to talk about methods of improving accuracy by doing pre - processing .
B: Remember @ @ ?
G: Pre - processing .
A: Well I think that that was just sort of A: I I already asked Thilo
B: Oh ,
B: you already did that .
A: but that , um , it would be helpful if I can stay in the loop somehow with , um , people who are doing any kind of post - processing ,
A: whether it 's to separate speakers or to improve the signal - to - noise ratio , or both ,
A: um , that we can sort of try out as we 're running recognition .
A: Um , so , i is that Who else is work
A: I guess Dan Ellis and you
C: Dan ,
C: yeah .
H: Yep .
B: Yeah , and Dave uh Gel - Gelbart again ,
A: and Dave .
C: Yep .
D: Yeah .
A: OK .
B: he 's he 's interested in in fact we 're look starting to look at some echo cancellation kind of things .
A: OK .
B: Which uh H: I am not sure how much that 's an issue with the close talking mikes ,
B: Hmm ?
H: but who knows ?
B: Well , let 's w i isn't that what what you want A: I don't know .
A: I 'm bad B: t No , so No , i w wha what you what you want when you 're saying improving the wave form you want the close talking microphone to be better .
A: It 's like <comment> like H: Right .
B: Right ?
B: And the question is to w to what extent is it getting hurt by , uh by any room acoustics
B: or is it just uh , given that it 's close it 's not a problem ?
B: Uh A: It doesn't seem like big room acoustics problems to my ear
A: but I 'm not an expert .
B: OK , so it 's A: It seems like a problem with cross - talk .
H: e I bet with the lapel mike there 's plenty , uh , room acoustic
C: Yeah .
H: but I I think the rest is cross - talk .
A: That that may be true .
A: But I don't know how good it can get either by those the those methods H: Yeah .
A: That 's true .
H: So I I think it 's just ,
B: OK .
A: Oh , I don't know .
H: yeah , what you said , cross - talk .
A: All I meant is just that as sort of as this pipeline of research is going on we 're also experimenting with different ASR , uh , techniques .
H: Mm - hmm .
A: And so it 'd be w good to know about it .
E: So the problem is like , uh , on the microphone of somebody who 's not talking they 're picking up signals from other people <comment> and that 's causing problems ?
A: R right , although if they 're not talking , using the the inhouse transcriptions , were sort of O K
A: because the t no one transcribed any words there
A: and we throw it out .
E: Mm - hmm .
A: But if they 're talking at all and they 're not talking the whole time ,
A: so you get some speech and then a " mm - hmm " , and some more speech ,
A: so that whole thing is one chunk .
A: And the person in the middle who said only a little bit is picking up the speech around it ,
A: that 's where it 's a big problem .
G: You know , this does like seem like it would relate to some of what Jose 's been working on as well ,
G: the encoding of the D: Yeah .
G: And and he also , he was A: The energy ,
D: Yeah ,
A: right . Exactly .
D: energy .
G: I was t I was trying to remember , you have this interface where you i you ha you showed us one time on your laptop
G: that you you had different visual displays as speech and nonspeech events .
D: Yeah ,
D: c Yeah . May I I only display the different colors for the different situation .
D: But , eh , for me and for my problems , is uh is enough .
D: Because , eh , it 's possible , eh , eh , in a simp sample view , uh , to , nnn , to compare with c with the segment , the the kind of assessment
D: what happened with the the different parameters .
D: And only with a different bands of color for the , uh , few situation , eh , I consider for acoustic event is enough to @ @ .
G: Mm - hmm .