Interactive speech and language systems for telecommunications applications at NYNEX

As information plays an ever-increasing role in our lives, users are demanding more in terms of their capability to retrieve and manipulate information. The paper is concerned with NYNEX's development of interactive speech and language systems for the provision of automated information services. While the long-term goal is to develop total system solutions to interact with users and assist them to search and retrieve information, progress is made in such a way that each component technology can be deployed by itself in various telecommunications applications. The authors discuss some of their findings, and draw from experience in technology development, lessons that have been learnt from service trials, and benefits that have been derived from others in the research community. The authors believe that advanced speech and language technologies can be quite acceptable to users, as long as a graceful and friendly human computer interface is also provided.<>