If you're hard of hearing or simply don't have time to read your blog feeds then Textcast can provide you with the perfect solution.
It can turn any text or text feed (such as a blog RSS feed) into audio that can be played using a variety of voices on your Mac. You can then save these to iTunes and listen to them on your iPod or iPhone. It's very easy to use too. A sample blog feed from Apple is provided as an example and simply requires you to click on it to bring up the feed. You'll see the text in the bottom window pane and to listen to it, simply click "Preview" in the bottom right hand corner.
The default voice is "Alex" but you can change this to over 20 different other voices including "Vicki", "Kathy" and the rather amusing "Pipe Organ". Alex is also optimized for fast rates, allowing you quickly plow through even lengthy texts. Listen for yourself! The speed and clarity of recognition is impressive but there of course certain words that are almost impossible to understand. It's also rather annoying having to listen to a robotic voice for more than 5 minutes.
Textcast is a great tool for anyone that is hard of seeing or doesn't have time to listen to their blog feeds and doesn't mind listening to a robot!
Changes
- Textcast is now free! Removed demo restrictions and all license checking code.
