ISCA DL 2007 Trip Report: prepared by Chin-Hui Lee (Nov. 19, 2007)
1. Leaving ATL at dawn on Nov. 7 and returning to ATL at night on Nov. 18
2. First Talk in Singapore:
Location: Nanyang Technological University
Time: 9:30-11:30am on Nov. 9, 2007
Attendance: 50 people from academia, industry and government
Topic: Fundamentals and Technical Challenges in Speech Recognition
Impact: In addition to the increasing speech research effort led by Dr.
Haizhou Li at Institute for Infocomm Research, the lecture also raised
interest in government agencies to invest more funding in speech R&D.
3. Second Talk in Manila:
Location: De La Salle University
Time: 9:10-11:00am on Nov. 12, 2007
Event: “Cutting Edge Researches in Digital Signal Processing Lectures”
Attendance: about 200 undergraduate students, and 50 DSP researchers
Topic: Statistical Natural Language Processing: Lessons from Automatic
Speech Recognition
Impact: The study of Tagalog, the key local language, has been gathering
momentum. The lecture has opened up dialogues between researchers in
the Philippines with the international speech community. We expect a
local speech community to be formed soon for initial database collection
and evaluation methodologies. There is a recent increase in funding for
speech research. Prof. Rachel Edita O. Roxas will take the lead.
4. Third Talk in Bangkok:
Location: Chulalongkorn University
Time: 1:15-3:00pm on Nov. 15, 2007
Event: Second Speech Community Forum
Attendance: 60 people from academia, industry and government
Topic: Fundamentals and Technical Challenges in Speech Recognition
Impact: Dr. Chai Wutiwiwatchai of the National Electronics and
Computer Technology Center hosted the visit as a part of Thailand’s 2nd
Speech Forum (the first was held in Feb. 2007). The lecture again opens
up dialogues between Thai speech researchers with international speech
communities. Dr. Wutiwiwatchai has set a long term goal to bid for an
Interspeech conference in Bangkok in the future.
5. Summary: I think ISCA is serving developing countries well with the planned DL
tours. The Lecturer also acts as an ambassador. I found people are very engaging
in such comfortable settings when the DL fits into part of an event, such as in
both Manila and Bangkok. The DL is also a contact for follow-up discussions.
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