Crowd-Sourced Speech Recognition and Audio Controls coming to Xbox One in Next Update

Microsoft has announced that the Xbox One will feature new audio controls in its May updates.

The news was announced through the blog of Major Nelson, aka Larry Hyrb, Microsoft’s Director of Programming for Xbox Live.

“With the new Sound mixer, you’ll be able to control the volume levels of two apps when you’re using Snap letting you decide which app is louder,” Nelson says. “You’ll also be able to control the volume levels when you’re using Kinect for chat.”

The new features will be available to early access members starting this week.

The update will also allow players to opt into a system that allows their speech data to be sent to Microsoft. The data then gets run through the algorithms that run the Kinect’s speech-recognition software, with the aim of improving the technology.

“This is completely optional and all voice data shared via this setting will be used for product improvement only,” Nelson assures us in his blog post.

On the one hand, it is interesting to see Microsoft turning to crowd-sourcing to improve the Kinect’s speech recognition software. On the other, Microsoft seems to once again be walking a fine line where players’ personal data is concerned, even if it is ostensibly for the improvement of their gaming system as a whole. Clearly, Microsoft is wary of public opinion regarding online privacy, since the press release emphasized that the voice-data collection is completely electoral.

We’ll keep you updated on Xbox One developments as they appear.

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Peter Yankowski

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Peter Yankowski is a freelance writer and blogger. When he's not getting blasted out of the digital skies by Messerchmitts, or cutting work to carve a twisty New England road, Peter writes about gaming news, history in games, and military geekitude.