Customer Reviews

It's Better to Be a Good Machine Than a Bad Person: Speech Recognition and Other Exotic User Interfaces at the Twilight of the Jetsonian Age

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I found "It's Better to be a Good Machine than a Bad Person" to be a great one stop shop for all things to do with the design and implementation of Interactive Voice Response (IVR) Systems.

Bruce has a knack for clearly explaining the all-important subtleties of human-machine interaction using voice as a means of output. His examples using well known computer software programs, automobile design and similar real life analogies serves the reader well in grasping how a seemingly trivial process like asking a caller an open ended question can have dire consequences for customer service if not thought through completely. Bruce seems to do instinctively what every good designer ought to do; he not only puts himself in the shoes of the user, but he seems to mentally "be the user" while working through the design phase. This is especially evident in the sections on theory of mind and error handling and recovery.

Aside from the technical aspect of UI design, Bruce also brings a wealth of real life experience on the business side of the call center and enterprise. I found this material to be especially interesting. It's the kind of knowledge one would normally only get if they dealt with the business folks and voice application owners on a daily basis for 20 years or more. You don't find that information in the technical literature or trade journals.

If you want a single source for all things IVR, I would definitely recommend this book.

"It's Better to be a Good Machine than a Bad Person" is a book for anyone that uses, designs or manages any speech related technology. Whether it is an IVR, a smart toy or in a car, if you use speech to interact to it, this is a must read book.

As a 20 year veteran in Voice User Interface (VUI) Design for Interactive Voice Response Systems (IVR), this book has become my 'bible'. It is not only a great source of knowledge, based on years of research from Bruce Balentine (whom I consider the "Father of Best Practices"), it is also very entertaining to read. Bruce has a way with words that makes this text read like a novel- including laugh-out-loud experiences with speech systems and people's `Jetsonian' perception of the future of speech.

Bruce has put his many years of research and experience in Speech Technology into an honest, straight forward and blunt text that most will find refreshing. After seeing many demonstrations by Sales and Marketing Teams making speech systems appear "sexy" and "human", I find it very refreshing to have a book that pokes fun at the anthropomorphic methodology of speech applications and gets right to the point- Customers just want to get the task done quickly and efficiently.

So, if you want to learn the bittersweet truth of Speech Technology, this is the book for you!

Though IT'S BETTER TO BE A GOOD MACHINE THAN A BAD PERSON is a retrospective on the development of speech recognition(by machine), author Bruce Balentine gives us an analogy for the baby boomers' life experience. He parallels the process and growth of machine speech with that of our own generation's path: from teenage band members and theatre apprentices to "slightly hippie" college students, and musicians morphing into the techies who embrace the innovations of the brave new computerized world, with parenting along the way, and now, indeed, as boomers facing the spectre of aging. Bruce interweaves the development, logic, and misconceptions in the life of speech recognition with that of our own journey to become better humans. Ironically, this technological treatise captures the zeitgeist of our time.
Note: Illustrator Leslie Degler is an outsider looking in (as he is very young) but has a marvelous knack for depicting the foibles and idiosyncrasies of the boomer generation.