[Kind]

Hey guys and gals,

I'm not an owner of the K2 so I would like to know how the new K2 owners feel about this new feature. Can it read the whole book for you? Is it useful for young children? Do you like the feature and why/why not.
Some of these reviews might help people like me and perhaps others make a decision on whether to get the K2 or not!!  Thanks in advance for your input.

 

[luvmy4brats]

Well, I don't love it and I don't hate it. It's a neat feature, but I don't see myself much unless I turn the volume down and use it to turn the pages for me when I'm on the treadmill (I DO like that part). I guess it depends on how you like audiobooks. I've been buying them for years from Audible. This won't replace audiobooks for me.

Can it read the whole book? Yes, if you don't mind a few words mispronounced words and strange pauses in your sentences. (Not too many, but noticable)

I prefer the male voice and I like it better when it's sped up to the fastest speed. It doesn't sound quite so robotic.

I DO think it can be helpful for kids depending on their age. If they want to have it read aloud while they follow along.

I didn't choose one of the poll answers because none of them fit.

 

[nelamvr6]

You didn't have a vote I could use:

I would have voted that I think it's pretty nifty, but unless I go blind I'll NEVER use it.

 

[Kirstin]

I say its cool but not as expressive as an audio book - yet I never expected the same quality.  I think it is actually better than expected and when I'm reading something I'm really into, I'll listen to it on the way to work to get that much more book in before I have to be a productive person at work.

So officially - I'm not an "I love it" but an "I'll use it on occasion"

 

[tamlyn2]

I really like it.  I was pleasantly surprised at how much better it sounded that what I was expecting. Yes it's robotic, but it does actually have some good pauses.  And the mispronounced words just make me laugh.  I can see myself using this alot a night when I get too tired to read but I'm not quite ready to "give up the ghost" and go to sleep.  This is also going to be great also when I'm driving places or cleaning. I always put this stuff off because I'm in a good place in my book!

 

[dflachbart]

I'm pretty impressed too... But I think there's still a bug in the software - the voice does not pause at all after a chapter / sub-chapter heading, it's reading the heading and the following text as one single sentence, which is often very confusing...

Dirk

 

[kim]

I like it.  I was rather impressed by the quality.  It has some strange pauses and stuff, but overall it's pretty good. 

But I don't think I will ever actually use it.  It might be a good idea for kids who want to read along (wait, someone already said that).

 

[dart]

I like it.  It works a lot better than what I had expected.  That said, I doubt that I would use it much.  If you have a child learning to read, it could be very helpful.

 

[Shizu]

As everyone is saying, it will pause at the strange place and not pause at the right place but overall I like it.

 

[VMars]

It's a lot better than on the Amazon web site, pretty decent. Maybe if i had a headache, or wanted to listen in my car. Other than that I won't use it much but that's not a criticism of the K2, I just never listen to books on audio, no matter who is speaking. 

 

[ElLector]

It's not the best, but, I must say, it's good and useful.  As I walked back home from the train station, I turned it on so my reading won't stop.  Not a bad feature, and I hope they'll continue to improve on it.  It's experimental, so let's cut it some slack.   

 

[Avalon]

I like it, I do NOT love it.  Today at the gym I couldn't find the auto-page-turn feature so I used the text-to-speech instead, it was great.  Turns the page if I want to read, and/or reads to me.  Did the job, kept me going in my book.  I love that I can keep up with my book while I'm driving, working out, etc., and I can get right back to reading, at the right place, when I want.  A great feature.

I think the Author's Guild is overreacting, however.  Text-to-speech will NEVER EVER take the place of a book well-read by an actor.  I don't have many audio books, but I love the ones I do have.  Like Jim Dale reading the Harry Potter books.  Peter Coyote reading "The River."  I-forget-who reading The Runaway Jury.  James Earl Jones reading anything.

The "reading" by an actor is truly a performance, and done well, is an art form.  Text-to-speech works when I can't read, but it's not really anything like an audio book.

 

[ElLector]

I honestly think they should have had a contract with Acapela. I think they're the best!

http://www.acapela-group.com/text-to-speech-interactive-demo.html

 

[Seamonkey]

I enjoyed having it read me Jeff Bezos' letter..

 

[Harmakhet]

I like it...it's a bit robotic and the mispronounced words are slightly amusing but I think it will fill in those gaps for me nicely.  I have a long commute to and from work so if nothing else I can have it read to me when I don't have a new Audible book.

 

[pidgeon92]

One of the best uses of this would be as a news/magazine article reader. This kind of reading doesn't need the inflections that novels benefit from.

 

[Seamonkey]

I agree, news articles, blogs, manuals.

Amusing that it says "whis PER net" and "Amazon <point> com" instead of dot com.

 

[artsandhistoryfan]

I honestly think they should have had a contract with Acapela. I think they're the best!

http://www.acapela-group.com/text-to-speech-interactive-demo.html

I went to Acapela and typed this in:

"What the heck does this kind of thing mean? I haven't heard or seen
anything like this, ever. I hope to see improvements though!"

I wondered how she would handle the expected emphases. Pretty good !

EDIT ADDED:
I think that defaulted to 'Heather' -- to change the voice you select something
else but then you have to click on "Say it!" while it readies it for the next voice
and then 'play' when it's ready.)
GRAHAM from the UK sounds like David Niven, and very dramatic at that.

Also, International Herald Tribune has a "Listen to article" option for every article
on its site (it has a lot of NYTimes content, being connected with its owners).
iht.com

They use ReadSpeaker, which has info and voice samples at this page.
(I chose the one for smallest companies.)

Voices

The American English male voice from readspeaker.com sounds asthmatic and anxious to me.
The American English female voice sounds a tad more normal.

But the BRITISH ENGLISH male voice sounds pretty darn good, for that short sentence, at least.

Here's a link to the Brit English guy's mp3
Brit English guy's voice

Hmmm, he sounds shaky tonight too. I wonder what causes that.

 

[floridonet]

I like it better than I thought I would!

 

[Sweety18]

Haven't received mine yet but I can see me using it when I'm too tired to read but can't fall asleep.