Errata: Natural Language Search

Natural language processing--designing computer systems that understand human language-- has proven a tough nut to crack. Yesterday a TechCrunch UK post covered the beta launch of True Knowledge, a UK startup offering a natural language search engine. They join competitors like Powerset, which has yet to launch but is apparently tackling the same problem. It'll be interesting to see if these go anywhere, or become the next Ask Jeeves.

True Knowledge has a good demo video explaining their technology. The most interesting part of which is hearing a British voice pronounce the word "beta." It comes out sounding like beet-ah. Is that how it's actually pronounced over there, or is that just a quirk of the guy talking? Team Wordie, UK division, please report.

Labels: beta, natural language processing, nextNY, Powerset, True Knowledge

posted by John McGrath @ 12:35 PM

Comments:

We do actually say 'bee-tah' over here.

# posted by

Anonymous : November 8, 2007 at 1:31 PM

And someone just informed me that when pronouncing less-than-zero decimal numbers like "0.2", you say "nought point two," rather than "zero point two." Which to me sounds like the setup for a who's-on-first joke.

# posted by

John McGrath : November 8, 2007 at 8:56 PM

That's true as well :-) How do you pronounce 'beta' then?

# posted by

Anonymous : November 9, 2007 at 5:25 AM

In the U.S. it's pronounced 'bay-ta', with the emphasis on the first syllable. There's an audio link here.

# posted by

John McGrath : November 9, 2007 at 10:20 AM

And data is 'day-tah' like Commander Data.

# posted by

ψ : November 24, 2007 at 5:03 PM

Thursday, November 8, 2007

Natural Language Search

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