A number of electronic music podcasts I’ve been listening to use the Mac’s built-in speech synthesizer to narrate or introduce the show (even Harry Shearer has a corny bit with one once in a while on Le Show) and indicate the song information. Even though I enjoy these shows, this cliche is incredibly irritating. Just because Radiohead got away with it in 1997, doesn’t mean it’s a good idea. “Fitter Happier” is the one track on Ok Computer I always skip. Spring for a $20 mic. No matter how much you hate your own voice when it’s recorded, it’s going to be less grating than “Vicki” or “Bruce”.
That said, I think it’s very cool that Mac OS X has assistive capabilities built-in.
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