Re: Workshop proposal for Interoperable Voice Agents on the Web

Kaz,

I'm pleased that you like my suggestions for an interoperable voice 
agent workshop.  Please invite me to the next planning meeting of the

"Workshop on User-friendly Smart Agents on the Web - Voice interaction
and what's next?"

Regards, -Jim


On 5/18/2022 10:11 PM, Kazuyuki Ashimura wrote:
> On Thu, 19 May 2022 02:58:40 +0900,
> James A Larson wrote:
>> [1  <text/plain; UTF-8 (8bit)>]
>> [2  <text/html; UTF-8 (8bit)>]
>> Kaz, Dave, and Jeff,
>>
>> Interoperable Voice Agents on the web is a hot topic these days. I encourage the W3C to host
>> a workshop to determine how W3C can participate in this world- wide effort. Below is a draft
>> description of a proposed workshop.
> Thanks a lot for your suggestion and concrete proposal below.
>
> As you know, we're already working on the preparation for the expected
> "Workshop on User-friendly Smart Agents on the Web - Voice interaction
> and what's next?":
>    https://github.com/w3c/strategy/issues/221
>
> and I think your proposal below is extending the original description
> of the propose for the Smart Agents Workshop.
>
> So my understanding is that we should collaborate and organize the
> workshop including your viewpoints as well, and I'd suggest you join
> the workshop committee.
>
> Am I correct?
>
> Anyway, I'm very sorry I've been swamped with the other assignments
> and the preparation for the workshop has not made much progress.
> It would be really nice to have your help and accelerate the workshop
> preparation :)
>
> Thanks,
>
> Kazuyuki
>
>
>> Regards
>>
>> Jim Larson
>> Open Voice Forum
>> (and former chair of W3C Voice Browser Working Group)
>>
>> Interoperable Voice Agents on the Web
>>
>>   
>>
>> General background
>>   
>> * Thanks to the advancement of HTML5 and related Web technologies, Web applications
>>   with speech capability are getting more popular for ease of user-interaction and richer
>>   user experience such as Apple's SIRI, Google's Voice Assistant, Amazon's Alexa, and
>>   others. Plug-ins, such as Speechly,https://www.speechly.com/, enable users to speak
>>   directly into any web application.
>> * Users interact with voice agents by exchanging information via spoken (or textual)
>>   dialogs. Users speak and listen by using speech recognition, speech synthesis and
>>   natural language processing technologies.
>> *  Voice agents are one of the essential applications available through various devices
>>   including smart speakers, mobile phones, tablet devices, eBook readers, and gaming
>>   platforms, automobiles, and IOT devices such as TV’s,  household appliances, security
>>   systems and garage door openers.
>> * During the breakout session, [Next  Directions for Voice and the Web Breakout – 18
>>   October 2021 (w3.org), there was discussion about potential needs for improved
>>   interaction among voice agents for web services.
>> * W3D recently published “Natural Language Interface Accessibility User Requirements
>>   [Natural Language Interface Accessibility User Requirements (w3.org)] identifies several
>>   requirements for interoperable voice agents
>>   
>> Focus
>>   
>> * The current status of integration of the voice-enabled agents from multiple vendors.
>> * What is needed for the voice interaction technology to be deployed globally for all the
>>   languages throughout the world.
>> * How voice agents interact with each other—how they can share data and processes.
>> * Discovery, location, and connectivity to voice agents throughout the world, including
>>   DNS, well-formed meta data, schema.org meta data, and meta data aggregation
>>   
>> * Privacy and security
>> * Accessibility and usability
>> * Internationalization and compatibility with region-specific technology
>>   
>> Applicable areas of application
>>   
>> * Voice agent
>> * Connected car
>> * Smart homes/Smart factories/Smart cities
>> * Smart speakers/Smartphones as a portal/user device
>> * IoT
>>   
>> Workshop deliverables
>>   
>> ·       Barriers to voice agent interoperability.
>> ·       Summary of current efforts on voice agent interoperability.
>> ·       Mission statement for W3C's future efforts on voice and the Web.
>>   
>> Who should attend?
>>   
>> * Many possible stakeholders including:
>>   
>> * Service providers/System implementers
>> * Govt (like Singapore)
>> * Users from various countries/communities
>>   
>> * Liaisons
>>   
>> * Open Voice Network
>> *  MPIA Community
>> * Stanford University Open Assistant Lab
>> * Technology providers (e.g., Amazon, Apple, Google)
>> * oneM2M
>> * Singapore Govtech