Not yet - this was our first technical blog post. You can check out the BoldVoice app and test out the sound-level feedback yourself. Or watch this app walkthrough video - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Sv5K4Z9P4c
As someone who took English classes for years growing up, I wish that were the case. In fact, most teachers don't really know how to teach pronunciation. Also, in a typical group class setting, it's challenging to give each student one-on-one feedback. On BoldVoice, we solve that with 1) unlimited instant feedback from sound-level AI - your most patient coach. 2) in-depth video lessons from the best coaches in the world (Hollywood accent coaches). I'm a cofounder of BoldVoice, by the way. :)
Native speakers are less helpful at this than you might think. Speech coaches are absolutely the way to go, but they're outside the price range for most people ($200+/hr for a good coach). BoldVoice gives coach-level feedback and instruction at a price point that everyone can access, on demand.
"If Victor wanted to move beyond this point, the sound-by-sound phonetic analysis available in the BoldVoice app would allow him to understand the patterns in pronunciation and stress that contribute to Eliza’s accent and teach him how to apply them in his own speech."
Indeed Victor would likely receive a personalized lesson and practice on the NG sound on the app.
If you're still actively using the app, the voice will be retained and processed so that you can receive instant feedback, and also so that you receive additional personalized practice items and video lessons based on your speech needs. If you don't want the samples saved "in perpetuity", you can request them to be deleted once you decide that you're done with the application. Hope this helps!
Hi, founder here! We're a YC-funded education app with over 1 million downloads, currently #7 on the Education chart of the App Store. The goal of the accent oracle tool is to help more non-native English speakers find out about BoldVoice. While it's important as consumers to be aware of data privacy with AI tools in general, I want to set the record straight that that's not the point of what we're doing here.
But great to hear that we got your accent right :)
Thanks - we're aware! There's also a concept of a general American accent. Since the app is for non-native English speakers, a general American accent is the goal more so than a regional accent. We built the app together with professional accent coaches -- if you're interested in our methodology, you can learn more on boldvoice.com.
Conspiracy theories are fun! But we're a language learning app (YC s21). We help non native English speakers to work on their accents so they can speak English confidently. The accent oracle is a marketing tool for us to get in front of new users.
Nice suggestion! BoldVoice focuses on helping non-native English speakers to learn the American accent, so we tailored the accent oracle to non-native accents specifically.
Fun to see this in the wild! I'm one of the co-founders of BoldVoice, AMA :)
p.s. I'm Albanian and it guesses either Albanian or English for me, sometimes randomly Spanish.
Check out BoldVoice (YC S21) - I'm biased as a cofounder :) We built this for immigrants who want to improve their spoken English, with a focus on pronunciation. You will get videos from speech/accent coaches + feedback from AI as you speak. The inspiration was my own experience as an immigrant in the US - I was struggling with speaking confidently, even though on paper my English was good. BoldVoice is what I wish I had back then - hope it can be helpful to you too.
Other than that - practice speaking as much as you can! Also, watch native speakers and focus on how they move their mouths to make sounds. Try to copy their speech cadence and repeat the phrases in their pronunciation and musicality. This is called shadowing and can be very effective (and free!)
There are some rules in English pronunciation, but there are a ton of exceptions and inconsistencies. To give you an example of a reliable rule: when a plural word ends in a vowel or a voiced consonant, the "s" is pronounced as "z" (eyes, dogs), but when it ends in an unvoiced consonant, it's pronounced as "s" (cats).
Our BoldVoice, we like to teach these rules because they are quick wins for most people. Then, a lot of the hard work comes in practicing and memorizing the many, many exceptions.
This is 100% correct. Muscles that aren't used in your mouth/articulators (because your native language doesn't require them) atrophy over time. It is possible to strengthen these muscles with isolated practice -- on BoldVoice we have coach videos where they give you "reps" of muscle movements (such as 20 tongue-ups). We call it "a gym for your mouth" :D It's hard work, but it's the best way to get results.
Oops, that's literally the name of one of our lessons "Practice your consonant skills" hence the awkward string, but I see what you mean. We'll look into handling those more elegantly because I agree, for English learners everything needs to be in perfect English.
And we have a placement test -- it's in the Resources tab, under "Assessment". Lmk how it works for you!
Re: 404... don't know what you're talking about ;)