Vote for Pedro!

view additional pages

“PEDRO”
THE FIRST MACHINE THAT REALLY TALKS
Voice-Operation Demonstrator Crowns Centuries of Effort by Scientists to Duplicate Human Speech Artificially

HE HASN’T any mouth, lungs, or larynx-but he talks a blue streak. His name is Pedro the Voder, and you may see him in action at the New York and San Francisco world’s fairs. His creation from vacuum tubes and electrical circuits, by Bell Telephone Laboratories engineers, crowns centuries of effort to duplicate the human voice.

To manufacture Pedro’s conversation, his operator employs a keyboard like that of an old-fashioned parlor organ. Thirteen black and white keys, fingered one or more at a time, produce all the vowels and consonants of speech. Another key regulates the loudness of the synthetic voice, which comes from a loudspeaker. A foot pedal varies the inflection meanwhile; so that the same sentence may state a fact or ask a question.

Read the rest of this entry »

This is the coolest freaking car. It’s like a combination of the Batmobile and a land speeder from Star Wars.

Ground-Hugging Motor Car Being Made in Sweden

Cruising the streets of Stockholm is a new Swedish car, built so low it seems to glide along the ground. The little car seats two and is designed to sell for about $386. When the plant is in full operation, about 50 of the cars will be turned out each week.