Nuance Expands Dragon Go!

Nuance Communications has expanded its Dragon Go! app for iPhone and iPod touch to let users launch popular movie and TV streaming services; get direct access to more of the most popular names in mobile content, like Spotify; get answers to the toughest questions from Wolfram|Alpha and Ask.com; and, find friends on Google+.

"The response to Dragon Go! has been nothing short of amazing, proving that consumers demand a fast, easy way to find and experience mobile content via the best destinations and sources available, not a list of preferential properties owned and controlled by one company," said Michael Thompson, senior vice president and general manager of Nuance Mobile. "With these latest enhancements, we're giving people open direct access to streamed movies and shows, more music, more social networks, and the ability to ask a question and quickly have it answered."

Dragon Go! is built on Nuance's language understanding technology that not only hears what people are searching for, but understands what they want. The app gives direct access to relevant results from nearly 200 of the most trusted and reliable content providers, including AccuWeather, Bing, ESPN, Facebook, Fandango, iTunes, Last.fm, LiveNation, Milo.com, OpenTable, Pandora internet radio, Rotten Tomatoes, Twitter, Wikipedia, Yelp, YouTube, Yahoo!, and now Spotify, Wolfram|Alpha, Ask.com, Dictionary.com, Google+ and others. Users can forget endless scrolling through pages of blue links and now just speak a query, and the app automatically determines and then delivers the best content destinations on the Dragon Carousel.

With these latest Dragon Go! content enhancements, people can simply say:

• "Play 'Give Me Everything'" if thy're a mobile Spotify Premium users to listen to Pitbull's hit instantly and on-demand, as well as pull up the video on the Media tab.
• "Watch 'Mad Men'" to instantly launch and stream the show with the ability to scroll along the Carousel to see show reviews and actor profiles.
• "Find John Smith on Google+" and be taken to John Smith's Google+ profile.

Additionally, Dragon Go!'s new question and answer feature lets people ask virtually anything, such as:

• "What is the square-root of 10?" to instantly compute the answer using Wolfram|Alpha's vast knowledge in thousands of subject areas.
• "Who is the highest paid actor in Hollywood?" and instantly get the answer from Ask.com.
• "What is the definition of nuance?" to see the definition, origin, and synonyms of the word from Dictionary.com.

"Dragon Go! understands users spoken questions, and Ask.com has the answers," said Dave Amato, director of business development and partnerships at Ask.com, a Dragon Go! partner. "The new Dragon Go! app provides mobile users even faster access to the information they want while on the go, whether they are looking for an answer around the best steakhouse in San Francisco, or how to fix a tire on the side of the road. By layering voice recognition on top of rich content and expert answers, Dragon Go! helps Ask.com leapfrog just blue links to deliver direct access to great content in a matter of seconds."

"Wolfram|Alpha is pleased to bring precise, computed answers from data curated by experts to the latest version of the Dragon Go! app," said Wolfram|Alpha Executive Director Luc Barthelet. "We are excited to explore how Wolfram|Alpha can further integrate with voice recognition technologies in the future."

Dragon Go! has also taken the Yelp experience to the next level, with a new top-down Map View feature that makes it quicker and easier to view relevant Yelp listings near them. And Dragon Go! has added Google+ sharing capabilities to its pop-up toolbar.

"People love being able to just simply speak and watch Dragon Go! give them the content they are looking for right away. It hears, understands and delivers," said Vlad Sejnoha, chief technology officer at Nuance. "We're deeply invested in continuing to evolve Dragon Go! with new features, more content providers, and richer app integration, and ultimately opening new doors for the consumer mobile destination experience. This is another step towards the mobile semantic Web, and we've just gotten started."

Dragon Go! combines Nuance's Dragon voice recognition technology with natural language understanding, unique analytical tools, and elements of artificial intelligence. Dragon Go! understands the intent of a query, and what a person wants to do, be it getting restaurant reviews, buying movie tickets, shopping, finding directions, listening to their favorite music, and more. Dragon Go! always puts the most relevant pages front and center, and additional content from related providers is accessible on the Carousel with just a flick of the finger. Dynamic results are provided center and to the right, with additional results from Google, Bing or Yahoo!, Wikipedia, Twitter, and YouTube available to the left.