> focus group testing for computer voices tends to result in female voices being chosen
I personally prefer the Alex voice from Mac OS to female voices. It has nice intonation. If only I could make it correct some of the mistakes it makes, for example not being able to distinguish "read" in past tense from "read" in present tense which makes it sound silly. Another error it makes is confusing "live" as in "live concert" with "live" as in "live in USA" (they are called heteronyms and are a special case in TTS).
I personally prefer the Alex voice from Mac OS to female voices. It has nice intonation. If only I could make it correct some of the mistakes it makes, for example not being able to distinguish "read" in past tense from "read" in present tense which makes it sound silly. Another error it makes is confusing "live" as in "live concert" with "live" as in "live in USA" (they are called heteronyms and are a special case in TTS).