Establishing a multimodal personality for a multimodal application in dependence upon attributes of user interaction

• US 8,600,755 B2
• Filed: 01/23/2013
• Issued: 12/03/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 09/11/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Nuance Communications, Inc. (Microsoft Corporation)
• Inventors: Cross, Charles W. Jr., Pike, Hilary A.
• Primary Examiner(s): Smits, Talivaldis Ivars
• Assistant Examiner(s): ROBERTS, SHAUN A
• Application Number:
  US13/748,441
• Publication Number:
  US 20130204620A1
• Time in Patent Office: 314 Days
• Field of Search: 704/270, 704/275
• US Class Current: 704/270
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 13/00 Speech synthesis; Text to speech systems
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 15/22 Procedures used during a speech recognition process, e.g. man-machine dialogue
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 17/00 Speaker identification or verification techniques
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 3/4936 Speech interaction details speech recognition per se G10L15/00

Abstract

Establishing a multimodal personality for a multimodal application, including evaluating, by the multimodal application, attributes of a user'"'"'s interaction with the multimodal application; selecting, by the multimodal application, a vocal demeanor in dependence upon the values of the attributes of the user'"'"'s interaction with the multimodal application; and incorporating, by the multimodal application, the vocal demeanor into the multimodal application.

Claims

1. A method of establishing a vocal demeanor for an application having a speech interface that presents speech content according to the vocal demeanor, the method comprising:

selecting, based on at least one attribute of a user, a particular voice family, wherein the particular voice family identifies a particular person'"'"'s voice by describing an overall nature and timbre of the particular person'"'"'s voice in specific terms; and

selecting the vocal demeanor for the application to use the particular voice family that identifies the particular person'"'"'s voice.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein:

the user may interact with the application using the speech interface and/or at least one non-speech interface; and

the selecting the particular voice family based at least in part on the at least one attribute of the user comprises selecting the particular voice family based at least in part on an attribute of a manner of the user'"'"'s interaction with the application.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein:

the at least one attribute of the user comprises at least one attribute of speech of the user; and

the method further comprises;

receiving speech input from the user; and

evaluating the speech input from the user to determine the at least one attribute of speech of the user.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein:

the at least one attribute of the user comprises at least one demographic characteristic of the user; and

the selecting the particular voice family based at least in part on the at least one attribute of the user comprises selecting the particular voice family based at least in part on the at least one demographic characteristic of the user.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein the selecting the particular voice family based at least in part on the at least one demographic characteristic of the user comprises selecting the particular voice family based at least in part on an age and/or a gender of the user.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the selecting the particular voice family based at least in part on the at least one attribute of the user comprises selecting the particular voice family based at least in part on stored information regarding the user.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the selecting the vocal demeanor to use the particular voice family comprises selecting a vocal demeanor from a plurality of predefined vocal demeanors, wherein each vocal demeanor of the plurality of predefined vocal demeanors has at least one speech attribute and selecting the vocal demeanor comprises selecting a vocal demeanor having a voice family attribute that matches the particular voice family.

8. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

configuring the application to present speech content using the vocal demeanor.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein configuring the application to present speech content using the vocal demeanor comprises storing information identifying that the speech content is to be presented using the particular voice family.

10. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

presenting speech content using the vocal demeanor, wherein presenting the speech content comprises presenting the speech content using the particular voice family.

11. At least one non-transitory recordable storage medium having encoded thereon executable instructions that, when executed by at least one computer, cause the at least one computer to carry out a method of establishing a vocal demeanor for an application having a speech interface that presents speech content according to the vocal demeanor, the method comprising:

selecting, based on at least one attribute of a user, a particular voice family, wherein the particular voice family identifies a particular person'"'"'s voice by describing an overall nature and timbre of the particular person'"'"'s voice in specific terms; and

selecting the vocal demeanor for the application to use the particular voice family that identifies the particular person'"'"'s voice.

12. The at least one recordable storage medium of claim 11, wherein:

the at least one attribute of the user comprises at least one demographic characteristic of the user; and

the selecting the particular voice family based at least in part on the at least one attribute of the user comprises selecting the particular voice family based at least in part on the at least one demographic characteristic of the user.

13. The at least one recordable storage medium of claim 11, wherein the selecting the particular voice family based at least in part on the at least one demographic characteristic of the user comprises selecting the particular voice family based at least in part on an age and/or a gender of the user.

14. The at least one recordable storage medium of claim 11, wherein the selecting the particular voice family based at least in part on the at least one attribute of the user comprises selecting the particular voice family based at least in part on stored information regarding the user.

15. The at least one recordable storage medium of claim 11, wherein the method further comprises:

configuring the application to present speech content using the vocal demeanor, wherein the configuring comprises identifying that particular speech content is to be presented using the particular voice family.

16. An apparatus comprising:

at least one processor; and

at least one non-transitory recordable storage medium having encoded thereon executable instructions that, when executed by the at least one processor, cause the at least one processor to carry out a method of establishing a vocal demeanor for an application having a speech interface that presents speech content according to the vocal demeanor, the method comprising;

selecting, based on at least one attribute of a user, a particular voice family, wherein the particular voice family identifies a particular person'"'"'s voice by describing an overall nature and timbre of the particular person'"'"'s voice in specific terms; and

selecting the vocal demeanor for the application to use the particular voice family that identifies the particular person'"'"'s voice.

17. The apparatus of claim 16, wherein:

the at least one attribute of the user comprises at least one demographic characteristic of the user; and

the selecting the particular voice family based at least in part on the at least one attribute of the user comprises selecting the particular voice family based at least in part on the at least one demographic characteristic of the user.

18. The apparatus of claim 16, wherein the selecting the particular voice family based at least in part on the at least one demographic characteristic of the user comprises selecting the particular voice family based at least in part on an age and/or a gender of the user.

19. The apparatus of claim 16, wherein the selecting the particular voice family based at least in part on the at least one attribute of the user comprises selecting the particular voice family based at least in part on stored information regarding the user.

20. The apparatus of claim 16, wherein the method further comprises:

configuring the application to present speech content using the vocal demeanor, wherein the configuring comprises identifying that particular speech content is to be presented using the particular voice family.