[EAS] Why we need Text-To-Speech

[Ed Czarnecki]

Clay hits one of the major issues, in that a "horse has already left the
barn".  It's out of the barn, through the gate, and several miles down the
road at this point.  And can't be called back without significant risk
(economic, operational, etc).

Product has already been designed (years ago in some cases), and shipped and
deployed (also years ago in cases).  Each manufacturer has made its own
design choices that make it too late to mandate a specific software module
for all makes and models of CAP EAS unit.  Quite simply, (1) one size will
not fit all, (2) much of this gear has already been deployed.

So, mandating a specific software module on the private sector manufacturers
is not really logistically possible (and I'm not sure even legal, depending
on how it was to be approached).  That would be a dangerous road for the FCC
to pursue, IMHO, has it could result in equipment upgrades or even
replacement (and who would pay for that?).

However, mandating adherence to a standard is another question.  Should the
W3C Speech Synthesis Markup Language (SSML) v1.0 become a standard to be
benchmarked (or conformed to, if you prefer)?  That, among other things,
would conform speech synthesis processors to a variety of requirements for
handling of natural (human) languages.  It's an open standard, and that
might be a place to start.  And, if I recall correctly, SSML conformance
would provide a measure of supporting accessibility, and is built into
number of .gov specifications for accessibility.  

So, the issue isn't about mandating software, and shouldn't be for a large
number of reasons.  The issue should be about identification and adherence
to well-established and open standards.  Moreover, it should be about
industry offering a solution, such as consensus on conforming to such
existing standards (as ECIG did with the EAS-CAP translation).

If a TTS engine can demonstrate conformance with W3C SSML - just as one
example - that could be an ready way to address the FCC's concerns about
quality and consistency of text to speech translation.

Ed

Edward Czarnecki, Ph.D.
Senior Director - Strategy, Development & Regulatory Affairs
Monroe Electronics, Inc. / Digital Alert Systems
ed.czarnecki at monroe-electronics.com
www.monroe-electronics.com
www.digitalalertsystems. com

-----Original Message-----
From: eas-bounces at radiolists.net [mailto:eas-bounces at radiolists.net] On
Behalf Of Clay Freinwald

Jim - 

I suspect that this will be a - market place driven decision.   What I mean
is if you choose to purchase an in-expensive EAS Box, you may well get a TTS
engine that cannot handle TTS issues as well as a more expensive device.

You could say the same about a lot of products, I suppose.

Would have been nice to have 'someone'  create a standard, however, I
suspect that the horse has already left the barn.

Clay Freinwald

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