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Free e-mail and SMS dictation with Jott
Posted March 24, 2008 4:08 AM by Alli Flowers
As I'm driving to school, I suddenly remember something I needed to tell my mother. But at this hour, she's not likely to have her phone on. If I wait until I get to school, I'll have forgotten what I wanted to tell her, and I really can't email while driving. So I Jott her.
Speed dialing is a snap when driving, so I just speed dial Jott, and dictate a quick email. It's off my mind, and waiting on her computer when she logs in to read her email with her morning coffee. The quality of the voice recognition is truly remarkable, but the even more astounding part, is that Jott is absolutely free!
I actually owe my mother props for finding Jott. It got a casual mention in an article she sent me on all the cool things you could do with your smartphone. Nothing else mentioned in that article was particularly new or useful, but Jott was a valuable find that I will be using regularly.
So what is it, and how does it work? Jott is a powerful transcription engine. From the user end, it is perfect simplicity. You add Jott to your speed dial, and when you're ready to send an email or an sms, you just call in. A pleasant voice answers and asks you "who do you want to Jott?" You speak the name of your contact, and the transcription engine verifies your choice. Once you have agreed on the choice, you hear a beep, and you speak your message. You can then wait around for the prompt to change your message, or you can just hang up. You will be copied with your message to your choice of email, sms, or both, and it's about 5 minutes to delivery.
The difficult part can be setting up your contacts. You can export your entire contact list through a choice of file types including .csf and .vcf. Jott also gives you the option of importing with Plaxo. Of course, if you're anything like me, your contacts are not all in the same order, so it might be easier to enter them manually. Your only other issue here is whether you want your contacts to receive emails, sms, or both.
If a given contact typically receives only text messages from you, just enter his phone number, and not his email. Likewise, if your contact is someone that you will want to email frequently, but not text, only enter his email. Most of my contacts would be miffed getting duplicate emails and sms messages, but there are a few that I both email and text; and let's not forget that sms is still restricted to 160 characters. The first test sms I sent wound up being split into two messages, and was disconcerting on the recipient's end. I came up with my own solution for those people that I both email and text, and entered them twice, once with their normal names for email, and once with their normal first name and "text" as their last name. Nicknames would also work here, providing you remember how you set them up.
Jott also allows you to set up groups, so that with one call you can send out an sms to your entire team to let them know the game was delayed, or an email to your whole department letting them know about the meeting at 4:00 on Thursday. The applications are limitless.
Jott is not limited to merely sending emails and sms though. You can use it for personal productivity in many ways. Suddenly remembered three things to add to your grocery list? Just Jott yourself and list the items. You'll get an sms and/or email with the items so that you can enter them in your shopping program or to your old-fashioned grocery list later at your convenience.
Jott yourself a reminder. Jott will text or email you 15 minutes before the time you specify to remind you whatever. You can also organize your Jotts into folders, or lists. If you are Jotting yourself for something work related, you can make a Work list. Jotting yourself for your club? Make a Club list. Then you have copies of your Jotts organized neatly on your Jott website in addition to having received email or sms notification.
Perhaps the most innovative use of Jott is the ability to assign web links. Jott Links exist for many popular web services such as Google Calendar, Blogger, Yahoo! Groups, Amazon, and more. While you are still only limited to 30 seconds, you can blog a lot in that time. Personally, I love the idea of being able to Jott Amazon. There's a book, a video, a something I want, but I don't want to take the time to search for it now, and I'll never remember later…so I Jott Amazon for the item, and the top 5 results are waiting for me in my email.
As a productivity tool, Jott is great. As a matter of safety, Jott is something that everyone should use if they can't wait until they get from behind the wheel of a car to send those texts or emails. It's free, so you have nothing to lose. Of course, because this is a service, it is not limited to Palm os or Windows Mobile. You can Jott from any mobile phone on any os, smartphone or dumbphone! Jott me an email and let me know what you think!
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