"The new iPod will tell you what it is about to play, removing the need for users to look at the screen while selecting music, and making the device safer and easier to use while driving, cycling or in badly-lit locations," claims The Scotsman.
Apple has flatly refused to comment on the design, but a patent lodged by the company in the United States makes clear the sixth generation of iPods will be able to convert those famous text menus into speech.
The ingenious system will rely on home PC processing power and clever software. The computer being used to download tracks will analyse each album title, song name and artist and convert them into sound files. These will be loaded into the iPod, along with the song files.
Comment: The Scotsman somewhat exaggerates the difficulty of converting text to speech -- we've been doing it for more than 50 years, and the 1984 Mac had it built in. But some modern systems are very good indeed, and if you read the story, this is one application where TTS could save lives.
