Facebook users get voice updates

Facebook and other social networking addicts can now post updates to their walls or Twitter feeds with voice calls through their mobile phones.

The voice calls are converted into text using technology from SpinVox.

The new service from SpinVox allows people to set up an account to manage their Facebook, Jaiku and Twitter updates from a personalised page.

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The technology means people speak the update they want posted to a social networking site into their mobile phone and this is then converted into text and posted directly to their chosen site.

People who are already signed up with Facebook, for example, can change their status and update their wall by making a mobile phone call without the need to send a text message or email or go online.

SpinVox said it plans to extend this service to other social networking and micro-blogging sites over the next few months.

Jonathan Simnett, global head of communications at SpinVox, said: "We think there is tremendous potential. It is about people speaking in the moment. They are saying what is happening now and you can't do that from a keyboard. It is about the immediacy."

The service is initially being offered free while the company looks at various revenue options, including an advertising-led subsidised service.

He said: "It is free for a period. The way we always do it at SpinVox is before we decide on a pricing structure we want to see the reaction to it, so a new service is always free initially."

Simnett explained: "The system we use is called VMCS. It automatically converts voice to text. The machine does the majority of the translation. It is very smart and intelligent. If it finds something it doesn't understand it passes it onto a language expert. That is then passed back to the machine so it is always learning."