Listen BeyondWords

With competition heating up, has BeyondWords created friction with their rollout of a totally new text-to-speech SAS web application?

Listen to Text

Dynamic text-to-speech for web pages became available with iOS 17 devices. Honestly, Siri sounds really good, automatically skipping text within <aside> elements. It essentially reads what is visible within Reader—another Safari option for simplifying page reading. For millions of customers, the Apple text-to-speech is just enough.

For slightly more versatility, you might prefer WebOutLoud, which extends the speech capabilities beyond web documents on desktop and mobile devices. Of course, there is a large audience of users without iOS devices, and web developers may desire greater control over on-page text exclusions.

Since March of 2022, I’ve shared tips for integrating BeyondWords with Shopify for “frictionless” automatic text-to-speech. This site uses both single-and multi-voice options for visitor enjoyment.

In August 2023, BeyondWords overhauled its text-to-speech protocols, introducing server- and client-side integrations for faster and speech conversions with more player controls and dynamic word highlighting. At this point, there does not appear to be a compatible Shopify integration tool. However, the legacy controller for manual or CMS method remains available.

Selective Text

Some of the backend changes include an RSS preference for encoded HTML. The format for RSS feeds complies more with W3C guidelines than before. BeyondWords now includes more robust user-definable HTML Filters and pronunciation Rules. Filtering elements instructs BeyondWords what to ignore.

Rules instruct BeyondWords how to pronounce words. With these robust user-definable options, it is no longer necessary to build a custom RSS feed. There is a RSS feed for frictionless conversion.

Inaudible Customers

Keeping current and competitive are important actions of any business. However, when implementing a major overhaul, there is an expectation of migration support. BeyondWords caters to enterprise clientele, who pay thousands of dollars per month. Those with more economical plans are fortunate if they receive technical support from a human chat box.

Here’s what happened when BeyondWords updated the feed parameters. Customer service began ignoring questions within the chat box. If they do reply, they point users to online documentation. Unfortunately, the revised instructions leave several unanswered questions. Receiving useful BeyondWords support is literally beyond words.

This site still uses BeyondWords text-to-speech. With custom mapping, the standard RSS feed for legacy conversion sort of works—though not as cleanly as the prior custom feed.

With the current Shopify theme, there’s a line break after each HTML class or element. This adds unnatural pausing throughout the audio. A page identification discrepancy causes some audio duplication, so rather than frictionless updates, we resort to manual conversions.

Tell me if you prefer Siri over BeyondWords within blog sections like this. Then compare it with the multi-voice enhanced audio within ClinicalNovellas.

Touched by Music

ClinicalNovellas are fictional stories covering multiple genres. Each includes premium audio with occasional sound effects. Using rich multi-voice character distinction provides an immersive listening experience, making it easy to follow conversations.

Do you love music? Where appropriate, some audio includes snippets of originally composed music loops. Now we’ve taken your listening experience a step further by embedding Apple Music songs within ClinicalNovellas text. These insertions at key locations add appropriate depth to stories. So pop in your earbuds and marinate your mind on all sorts of auditory delights.

Enjoy a Mystery

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