Facebook will pay some of its users for voice recordings that will be used to make better its speech recognition technology.
The company decided to take this step after it was exposed for listening and transcribing voice recordings to improve speech recognition systems without the knowledge of the customers.
Companies like Amazon, Apple, Google, and Microsoft were also caught in the act.
Facebook is launching a new program in its Viewpoints market research app called “Pronunciations” and will allow users to make voice recordings on it.
If a user qualifies to be part of the program, the social media giant says the user will be able to record the phrase “Hey Portal” followed by the first name of a friend from your friends list. You’ll be able to do this with the names of up to 10 friends, and you have to record each statement twice.
Users should not expect much pay for their recordings. When a user completes one set of recordings, the one gets 200 points in the Viewpoints app and can’t cash out in the Viewpoints app until the user earns at least 1,000 points. That only translates to a $5 reward via PayPal. However, Facebook says users may be offered the opportunity to make up to five sets of recordings, so there is the potential to meet that 1,000-point goal and get paid.
Facebook has assured users that the voice recordings users provide will not be linked to their Facebook profile and that the company doesn’t share Viewpoints activity on Facebook or other Facebook-owned services without permission.
The company also revealed that the program will be slowly rolled out to US users over the age of 18 and have more than 75 Facebook friends.
