A Safer Way to Jot Notes on the Road

It happens all the time: you’re driving down the highway when suddenly a great idea hits like a lightning storm. You rustle through the glove box for a pen (while still keeping a watchful eye on the road), but your desperate search proves inkless. No big deal, you figure you’ll just jot it down once you get to the office - but by the time you get there it’s already too late. Like a dream, once so vivid and detailed, the genius idea has vanished into the depths of the mind, never to return again.

While that description might be a little on the dramatic side, the actual situation is a common one – and one that has spurred a lot of innovative solutions. Frequently depicted as a tool of writers, psychiatrists and FBI agents in movies, the miniature tape recorder has become the go-to device for convenient note taking. Digital capabilities have made this invention even smaller in recent years for greater portability. But the major disadvantage of the digital voice recorder (which is also the major disadvantage of hauling around a pen and paper) is that if a person doesn’t have the recorder on them, the idea is still lost. Now, a new service is using the convenience of cell phones to provide an alternative solution. And unlike digital recorders, which usually cost $50 or more, the service is free.

Jott is a free voice-to-text service designed to help people stay organized and record those sudden strokes of genius that usually occur at the most inconvenient times. Once a person registers on the Jott Web site, an account is created and the Jott phone number is provided. The user then programs the Jott number into a cell phone’s speed dial, and, whenever a sudden idea hits, calls up Jott. A pre-recorded voice immediately greets a person with the question: "who do you want to Jott?" To leave a personal message, the user responds "me" or "myself". After the beep, the person leaves a message (up to 30 seconds long) and waits for the voice to say "got it". Once the user hangs up, Jott sends an email or text with the voice message transcribed.

Along with sending messages directly to a person’s mailbox, Jott also has a few other capabilities. Busy individuals can use Jott to schedule appointment reminders, and Jott will give them a call fifteen minutes before meeting time. Jott also can be employed to send email or text messages to other people. By programming names, phone numbers and email addresses of friends and colleagues into a Jott account, an individual can then send emails or texts from a car, bed or beach, by simply stating the person’s name upon calling. All sent messages are stored in a person’s Jott account for later reference, and a person can even access audio files of original voice messages for verification.

Being a free service, one would expect the Jott Web site to be littered with advertisements, but, surprisingly, ads are nowhere to be found. Additionally, the site has a simple layout and registering an account is a pretty quick and easy process. Transcription emails are also fairly quick to arrive (within a couple of minutes of the message usually), and most of the text is verbatim. The exception to this is names and other proper nouns. For example, a message left for Jott about the article topic "Wii fitness bundle" somehow became "Resip Banwell" in translation. Well that may be mostly the fault of the mumbling speaker, a disclaimer at the beginning of the transcription email noted that they had difficulty understanding the message and provided a helpful link to the audio file. With such ease of use, Jott could be a godsend for individuals whose minds churn out their best ideas in the middle of the night or those of us with cars upholstered in post-it notes.

Anyone with a phone number and email address can use the FREE Jott service by registering at the Jott Web site.