Voice Dream - Natural Reader

I’ve had many apps. This is one that has provided immeasurable value to me. Being successful at my job requires an incredible amount of reading. In the five years that I have been using Voice Dream I have managed to increase my reading consumption by more than 20-fold. That seems like a number that is hard to believe but it is not hard to believe if you just do a little bit of math. Previously, I could only make two hours each day where I was sitting someplace quiet that would allow me to read. Using voice stream, however, I am now typically reading about six hours each day. This is because voice stream allows me to read when I otherwise would not be able to read in a traditional way. I can read as I am getting dressed and getting ready for work. I can read on my commute to work. I can read when I’m cleaning up around the house or gardening or whatever. So there is your threefold increase. In addition to essentially creating more time to read, voice stream allows me to read each paper. Over time I have managed to increase my typical reading speed to 500 words per minute. That is a rate five times faster than when I am doing traditional reading. So that is a five fold increase. So we have a 3-fold increase in reading time and a 5-fold increase in reading speed. 3X5=15 A 15-fold increase in total reading...which, in turn, translates into a >15-fold increase in my understanding of topics I am learning. Amazing. Thank you, Voice Dream Reader! ~Voice Dream Evangelist

I purchased this app several years ago. Since I purchased it I have used it to “read” hundreds of books and articles. Most of the material I have “read” with this app is not available as a professionally narrated audio and never will be. This includes many obscure religious and medical texts and manuscripts — more than I can count. I am constantly on the go and almost never have time to sit down and read a printed or digital book. Yet, with this app I have been able to get through many thousands of pages of material that never would have been possible otherwise. I listen nearly every day while I drive, walk, jog and sometimes while I work. Although the app is not perfect (pronunciation is sometimes incorrect) it is good enough for me to understand. I appreciate that the developer has continued to improve the product. For example, in the last year I discovered I can use it to listen to podcasts and even videos that I download for offline use. I would be ungrateful not to leave a 5 star review, because without exaggerating I can say that this has changed my life. I now have a steady stream of valuable information flowing to my mind. This is information that was simply out of reach to me before — mainly due to constraints on my time. This has helped me immensely with preparing to teach classes and in my medical career.

The standard out of the box voice (Heather) is the most human-like I’ve ever heard. Also, the “pronunciation dictionary” feature is amazing - allows you to change how the voices pronounce certain words if you don’t like the default pronunciation. This is great for the few instances where there’s a word or acronym or name that occurs frequently in a text (reoccurring newsletter or book) that I want Voice Dream to say it differently from the default. I hope the App is taking this data that we users meticulously enter and is using it to guide future adjustments and improvements to the reading engine that the developers build. While this app is nearly flawless in my eyes now, one annoying bug has keeps in recently: when switching into the app to a reading that has been paused, it frequently jumps to a random point in the text on the screen. If I hit play, it resumes playing at the point where I left off and a quick 2-finger tap will take me back so the right part of the text shows on the screen, but it’s annoying to have to do this when I am regularly switching between Voice Dream and another app I use to take notes on the books I read (Microsoft Word, in case that helps catch the bug!). I hope the team can hunt this one down as they have caught all the others in the past. Keep it up! :)