We hope everyone is
doing well. This month for our newsletter prize one lucky winner will
receive a NextUp.com golf shirt. Just read on for details on how you
can enter. Thanks for staying tuned!
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[2 - New Voices from
Cepstral]
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NextUp.com and
Cepstral are happy to announce new voices are now available. The most
exciting one is Callie, the best Cepstral voice yet. You can hear
Callie read this newsletter at
http://nextupdownloads.com/files/newsletter55.mp3
Callie and the other
premium Cepstral voices are $29.95 each.
Cepstral also has
some very unique character voices. While these aren't great for
listening to serious text, the character voices include Shouty, Whispery
and a few others that are fun to play with. The character voices are
only $6.99 each. Samples, an interactive demo, and details on
purchasing Cepstral voices are available at
http://www.nextup.com/Cepstral.html
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[3 - TextAloud Tip
of the Month - Better Comprehension using a Variety of Voices]
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It is often easier
to comprehend and remember things you've heard versus what you read.
With the new high-quality Text To Speech voices we've introduced over
the last few years, listening and understanding continues to become
easier. But listening to a single voice, no matter how natural it is,
can become monotonous and easy to tune out.
We've built in to
TextAloud features that make using a variety of voices easy. By
changing voices frequently, you are more likely to pay attention and
retain the information.
Within TextAloud, if
you choose Options->Voice and File Options from the main menu, all of
the voices available on your system are listed. Top level folders are
the voice type, then the individual voice names are under that. By
selecting a voice, you can click the Enable/Disable button on the right
to choose which voices you want available to TextAloud. Once you enable
multiple voices that you like, click OK. Next, choose
Options->TextAloud Options on the main menu. Under the section labeled
"Multi-Article Options" you'll find the setting for Voice Selection.
The Options are:
Default - Every new
article added will use only the voice you've chosen as your default
voice.
Random - When a new article is added, it will be assigned a random voice
from your enabled voices.
Round Robin - Each new article added will be assigned a different voice
from your enabled list. Once you've cycled through all available
voices, the process starts again from the top of the enabled voice list.
By using either of
these methods, you'll hear a wide variety of voices as you listen to
articles or audio files.
TextAloud also has
the ability to switch voices within the middle of an article. This is
one of the features that is only available when TextAloud is set to use
SAPI5 Voices Only. To do that, click Options->Voices and File
Options->Engines/Voices, then select either 'Use Sapi5 Only' or 'Use
Both'. After this is done, you can right-click at any spot within the
text and choose Insert Voice Change (or choose Edit->Insert Voice
Change) and TextAloud will insert a special voice change TAG. You can
have multiple voice switches within an article. This allows you to
simulate multiple people speaking the text, for special cases such as
reading a script or simply creating variety within an article.
NextUp.com offers
optional premium voices from AT&T Natural Voices (TM), NeoSpeech (R),
Nuance/ScanSoft RealSpeak (R) and Cepstral (R) for the most
natural-sounding computer speech anywhere. Click on the link below for
samples and more information:
http://nextup.com/TextAloud/SpeechEngine/voices.html
Available languages
include U.S. English, U.K. English, Indian Accent English, Scottish
Accent English, French, Canadian French, Latin American Spanish,
Castilian (European) Spanish, Mexican Spanish, Brazilian Portuguese,
European Portuguese, Russian, Mandarin Chinese, Cantonese Chinese,
Korean, Japanese, German, Italian, Dutch, Belgian Dutch, Danish,
Swedish, Norwegian, Polish, and Arabic.
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[4 - Keeping up with
What's New with TextAloud and NextUp.com]
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We often get emails
asking about the latest version of TextAloud, what has changed, and what
else new we have available.
You can find out
what version of TextAloud you have by choosing Help->About from the main
menu. The version number is near the top of the window.
Our most current
version of TextAloud is always available at
http://nextup.com/TextAloud/download.html
The version number is listed on that page, and you'll also find there a
link to the TextAloud release notes. They are at
http://www.nextup.com/TextAloud/ReleaseNotes.txt
It isn't interesting
reading for most people and sometimes gets a little technical, but it
may help you decide whether you want to download the latest version.
While you don't need to download every version, at times new features or
bug fixes that could be affecting you will be added.
To upgrade, if your
current version of TextAloud is 2.xxx (anything starting with 2), you
can simply exit TextAloud via File->Exit, then download and install the
new version directly over the old version.
If your current
version is 1.xxx, then while the upgrade isn't free, you should contact
us for details on what version 2 can do for you and for information on
how to upgrade.
We also frequently
have other news including new voices available, new features, and other
news we think you may find useful. This information will be listed on
our What's New Page at
http://nextup.com/whats_new.html
For those who use RSS Readers, the same information is available in your
RSS Reader via
http://www.nextup.com/nextup.xml
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[5 - Enter to Win a
NextUp.com Golf Shirt]
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All you have to do
to enter this month is send an email to
newsletterdrawing@nextup.com
We'll draw a winner from entries received by Friday, June 2 to win a
NextUp.com golf shirt.
If you find our
products useful, please share the news with your friends and at your
place of business. We offer Volume Pricing with Site Licensing
available to schools, organizations and businesses. If you'd like more
information on this or have questions about any of our products, please
don't hesitate to contact us at
support@nextup.com
Thank you for your
interest in our company & products.
The NextUp.com Team
NextUp.com
The Power of Spoken
Audio
http://www.NextUp.com
A Division of NextUp
Technologies, LLC
