Patent Document ID: 7716052
Application ID: 11101223

Base Claim:
1. A method comprising: receiving a text word; and in response to receiving the text word, concatenating, by a data processor coupled to a memory, pre-recorded speech segments that are derived from a plurality of speakers to form audio data configured to generate an audible speech word that corresponds to the text word, wherein concatenating the pre-recorded speech segments comprises selecting speech segments for concatenation based on at least one cost function, where the at least one cost function comprises a first cost function where a cost of a speech segment from a particular speaker of the plurality of speakers is based at least in part on a size of a dataset comprising pre-recorded speech segments from the particular speaker as compared to sizes of other datasets each comprising pre-recorded speech segments from other speakers in the plurality of speakers, where the first cost function assigns a first cost for a first speech segment from a first speaker of the plurality of speakers that is lower than a second cost for a second speech segment from a second speaker of the plurality of speakers, where a first size of pre-recorded speech segments in a first dataset from the first speaker is greater than a second size of pre-recorded speech segments in a second dataset from the second speaker.

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Claim 8:
8. The method as in claim 1 , where at least some of the pre-recorded speech segments are derived from a speaker by sampling, digitizing and partitioning spoken words into word units.