Has anyone else used TTS (Text-To-Speech) for proofreading?

I'm just starting to write, and proofreading has been a real problem. I can reread the same story over and over and still miss so many simple things.

Then I discovered TTS, and that changed everything.

Running TTS over a story catches more errors than anything else I've ever tried. I catch things my eyes and my brain automatically correct when I try to proofread.

I use Amazon Polly. It's basically free, though you need a credit card to sign up. The free tier is 5 million characters a month, and it's $4/million after that.

I use "Natural Reader". No word limits in the free version, though it does pause every few thousand words and you have to wait for a nag screen, and it only has one free voice. The paid voices are a little more articulate and varied.

It's absolutely been a valuable tool to me. I typically catch something I've missed in all the previous reviews, and usually about one for every 4k words or so of the story.

Wouldn't go without it now.

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loquere said:

This is an advertisement.

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Don't think so. Amazon wouldn't waste their time with something like this, and someone attempting to get affiliate referrals or something would have added a link, otherwise it's pointless to them.

No signature line. No hidden images. None of the trappings of an affiliate scammer.

Regardless, it's something authors here can consider that's quite useful. With none of the more nefarious hints of spam, I'm willing to give it the benefit of the doubt. :: shrug ::

loquere said:

This is an advertisement.

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I didn't link anything (no special code to send me money from people clicking a link)

Amazon doesn't make money from people having short stories read back to them at a volume that makes it a free service. - In fact they would prefer it of none of us used them for this.

The service targets people creating apps. They want to make money on apps with millions of users using TTS.

(that said, it was my first post, so I understand being suspicious - that's why I didn't link to it)


EDIT:
On a side note, I've received 5 spam PM's since signing up this evening. I changed myself to anonymous, and have not relieved another. Is there a better solution I'm missing? Does going anonymous help?

Forward the spam PM's to Laurel. She will pretty much kill the accounts and ban them. The posts will disappear but it might take a few days for the system to realize they are gone. It might show an unread PM where none exists.

Evilynn, thanks very much for bringing my attention to Poly.

I've used the TTS built into Firefox's Reader view for proofreading. It's okay (on Windows... don't bother with it on Linux). I just looked at Poly and the voices sound amazing.

I'm interested in TTS - not only as a writer, but as a reader as well.

I'm a big fan of audiobooks when on long drives or when flying. So I wouldn't mind finding a way to listen to LIT stories via TTS. Which tools would you recommend for that? I'd prefer something I could use on my phone or tablet.

And (possibly a different answer) - which tool would be best for playing back my own work?

Haulover said:

I'm interested in TTS - not only as a writer, but as a reader as well.

I'm a big fan of audiobooks when on long drives or when flying. So I wouldn't mind finding a way to listen to LIT stories via TTS. Which tools would you recommend for that? I'd prefer something I could use on my phone or tablet.

And (possibly a different answer) - which tool would be best for playing back my own work?

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I can't really help with that. When it comes to stories, I only use TTS for proofreading. I only copy/paste a few paragraphs at a time. Polly has a character limit of either 1500 or 3000.

Evilynn said:

I can't really help with that. When it comes to stories, I only use TTS for proofreading. I only copy/paste a few paragraphs at a time. Polly has a character limit of either 1500 or 3000.

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Thanks.

I'll keep trying...

We use several free TTS apps (depending upon the platform). The best free one we've found is Espeak and can be downloaded from http://espeak.sourceforge.net/download.html.

It has no word limit we've found, and it allows different voices. I has helped us find numerous issues, but especially missing words.

-MM