Milo Street
CTO - Echo Corporation
Date: October 18, 2007
Snippet 1: "How did you get started in technology?" (1:35)
Snippet 2: "Tell us how about the birth of the ECHO II" (5:20)
Snippet 2: "Strong support of the ECHO from Bud Hagen, co-founder of CTG " (:57)
Download: Full Transcript
Milo's engineering degree, his knack for electronics and programming, a master's degree in medical electronics, and the arrival of the Apple II all preceded his research and development of a speech synthesizer.
His first ECHO II had a phoneme system called Speak Easy, graduating into Text Talker and then evolving into the education market, adding some applications for the blind. Unlike the few higher-end devices available, the ECHO was priced at $99.95 so that schools could afford it, leading to widespread adoption, especially since it had a vocabulary of 800-1000 words that could be added.
In the 90's Milo became involved in digital audio, designing products for professional musicians and music interfaces for recording. He shares his interesting insights into the iPod Touch and iPhone possibilities in the future and his ongoing excitement about new directions in technology.