Before the Dawn of IP Telephony - Part 31
Expression discovered in human voice (fall 2002)
These contents translated a serialization article carried by ITPro IP telephony ONLINE published by Nikkei Business Publications, Inc. Jump to the original (Japanese).
Shinji Usuba
General Manager
eSound Venture Unit
Oki Electric Industry Co., Ltd
After obtaining the chip handling broadband voice, I decided to give it a test. After much effort in obtaining a handset, I was disappointed to find that the voice I heard was no different from a normal phone.
No drastic improvement. In fact, the voice was no different from a conventional telephone. I was deeply disappointed after hearing the much anticipated "broadband voice."
Does majority of the composition making up the human voice lie within the bandwidth of the conventional telephone? If so, does that mean there is essentially no effect even when widening the bandwidth passing voice?
Photo 1: OKI's Annex 5 where the test was conducted
The laboratory was located on the 7th floor.
After several hours, however, there was a report from Toru checking the prototype device saying there was an error in the parameter setting. He had discovered the error and was just finished making the needed adjustment. I was starting to see a glimpse of hope. Hoping things would turn out different this time, I returned to the laboratory and stood in front of the receiver again (photo 1).
We have to commercialize this
I picked up the prototype receiver that has just been made and adjusted, and held it to my ear.
"Hello?"
It was an electrifying moment. When I heard the voice through the receiver, I distinctly remember struck by a sensation of darkness instantaneously becoming bright as day before my eyes. It was a moment I will never forget. What I heard was a voice with overwhelming spatial properties.
I was made aware that human voice was rich in uniqueness, like a facial expression. And I could feel the expression through the receiver.
My first and immediate impression was, "Hey, I must have one of these."
I was convinced that the reason why broadband telephones didn't become popular during ISDN was not because of the voice quality being the same as conventional telephones.
At the same time, images of various applications ran through my head like a revolving lantern.
I quickly called my associate, Hiromi Aoyanagi, who was in another room. As he raised the receiver to his ears, I spoke into mine.
"Hello?"
Immediately, the expression of Hiromi's face changed while holding the receiver in his hand. I vaguely remember the details of the short exchange we made through the receivers, but I will never forget the excitement I felt directly from his voice. As we exchanged a few words, we were able to sense the expression of one another's voices rather than the content of the messages themselves. And we knew that we were thinking of the same thing.
"We have to commercialize this."
Continued to next page: Voice quality of IP telephony can go beyond conventional telephones...
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