The voice is there. So why do so many of us still reach for the remote or turn on subtitles? The problem may not be volume, but everything that happens to dialogue before it reaches us: the mix, the codec, the television, the room and, finally, our own hearing and attention. In this article, I explore why intelligibility has to be preserved from source to listener — and how technologies such as DTS Clear Dialogue, SpeakBar and Auracast are approaching different parts of the s

What happens when the listener is no longer just at the end of the audio signal chain? Recent research is beginning to measure not only sound, but also what happens in the body, the inner ear, and the brain while we listen. One experimental system has gone further, using neural attention to amplify the conversation a person was trying to follow. In this article, I explore the path from measuring the listener to making human attention part of the audio system itself.

We usually think of automotive audio as entertainment. But as AI and driver-assistance systems evolve, sound is becoming something more: a way to guide attention, communicate risk, and help us notice what we might otherwise miss. In this article, I explore how audio is becoming part of the vehicle’s intelligence — and why the most important sound may not be music at all.

If you don’t rely on a screen reader, captions, or assistive devices, it’s easy to see AI as just another productivity trend. But for millions of people, a single accessibility update can be the difference between “I can’t do this alone” and “I finally can.” That’s why this latest Apple announcement on Apple Intelligence–powered accessibility features stood out to me.

While the world watched Trump and Xi shake hands over trade and tariffs, something else was happening in Chinese laboratories. The China Brain Project — 3.1 billion yuan, 15 years, seven ministries aligned — is mapping the human brain neuron by neuron, with clinical BCI targets for 2027 and global market leadership by 2030. Your earbud can already read your brain. China just decided that's not enough.