Their service claims to use high-tech voice recognition technology, their ‘How it Works’ page explains that a “Voice Message Conversion System, known as ‘D2’ (the Brain)” is used.

The BBC’s Technology correspondent, Rory Cellan-Jone, has revealed online in his article Voice Technology Under Fire that this is often not actually the case.

Furthermore, Spinvox’s Data Protection statement states that user’s messages never leave the EU, when in fact they are often transcribed by workers in call centres in Egypt or the Phillipines. There are even comments about Egyptian workers exposing sensitive customer information on Facebook.

This is a huge test for Technology & Trust!

Interestingly, during a debate on Radio 4′s Today programme this morning, Evan Davies (who is a Spinvox user), described it as an addictive service which he found very useful despite its inaccuracies, and wondered whether it really mattered how the service actually worked …

It is going to be fascinating to see how this company copes with this kind of exposé.

Just one extract from the BBC’s article:

“The machine doesn’t understand anything,” he explained. “You have to start typing when you hear the message.”

Other call centre staff in South Africa and the Philippines have discussed on blogs how they have also transcribed calls for Spinvox.

A source at the company has told the BBC that the vast majority of messages are in fact converted into text by staff at call centres.

The fact that messages appear to have been read by workers outside of the European Union raises questions about the firm’s data protection policy.

The firm’s entry on the UK Data Protection Register says it does not transfer anything outside the European Economic Area.

OK, for the average user all you need to know is that it is simply faster and more intuitive to use.

Go get the latest Firefox 3.5 NOW!

It’s just better.

We’ll tell you more about useful plugins to make your web browsing life even better in due course, but Firefox is Step 1.

For the nervous amongst you:

• You can uninstall at any time.
• You can have Microsoft’s Internet Explorer installed as well as Firefox.
• You can alternate between them as you wish.
• You can set either to be your preferred browser.
• Either will import bookmarks, favourites etc from the other.

Want to see just how popular this browser is?

Check their download tracker – worldwide max up to 72 downloads per second so far!!

In case you’ve missed all the hype, Windows 7 is Microsoft’s new Operating System for PCs and laptops.

It has received lots of positive reviews, and is therefore certainly worth having.

Windows 7 will not be ready for full public release until October 22nd.

However, between now and then, most major PC manufacturers will offer a free upgrade path from Vista to Windows 7 if you buy a machine from them which is included in this offer.

You won’t want to miss out, you’d be silly to be stuck with Vista when there’s a free upgrade route available.

So, check the manufacturer’s websites for further details before making any further PC or laptop purchases.

Acer

Dell for Home

Dell for Small Business

Hewlett Packard – NB your machine must start life with factory-installed Vista Business or Premium.

Sony

Check the details and be especially aware that the upgrade offer may be model specific and initial Vista software version specific.

NB between now and September it is highly likely that thousands of students will buy new machines as they head back to school or off to university, please pass this message on and make sure that they don’t miss out!