Talking Yellow Pages for the 21st Century

Yellow Pages Group, the Yellow Pages publisher for all of Canada, is now taking an old concept €" talking Yellow Pages €" into a new era. John Kelsey knows all about the first 3,000 attempts to make talking Yellow Pages both an operational and a business success.

Notice the word €œattempts€ €" because so far, few talking YP services have ever lasted long enough to meet the lofty and often grandiose predictions. YPG €" in concert with CallGenie and Nuance €" is launching the €œfirst€ interactive, voice recognition-based Yellow Pages service. HelloYellow €" the new service's trademarked name €" is set to be tested in Toronto.

We€™ve been saying for some time now that Yellow Pages on cellphones or PDAs will require a voice interface. It appears that time has come. Now if the machine can understand the difference between €œa€ and €œeh,€ YPG and its partners will really be on to something.