1 hour ago, RJC68 said:

Again, if they use them regularly they could end up paying for them the next month and the month after ..................................

It doesn't automatically take money from you when you run out of voice. That's what people mean when they say it isn't a subscription.

When you run out of voice time you need to go and manually top it off.

 

Edited February 22, 20242 yr by Tuskin38

2 hours ago, RJC68 said:

Again, if they use them regularly they could end up paying for them the next month and the month after ..................................

I'm sorry, but I don't understand your logic regarding that this is a 'subscription'. It isn't. You pay as you go. Do you also see filling gas in your car, as a subscription, then?

OK - I get all the stuff about basic and premium voices. I just need one piece of clarification about the offline setup. If I push the PTT button do I just get a UI open with different phrases to use like the MSFS ATC window or do I actually get to talk like I do in P2Atc. Assuming my voice is then transmitted, is there a charge? The main appeal for me is the voice interaction.

Mike

From the dev himself about the charges.

 

6 hours ago, pete_auau said:

think might  explain it  better

 

Thanks for the video. One thing this video didn't mention (unless I missed that part of the video) is that PTT also deducts your transmission time. This is a very key point, because I'm sure even if many of us use the offline voice model for the ATC controller that we talk to, and we also use the offline voice model for the AI ATC communication, many of us would still like to use PTT to talk to the ATC controller.

And by using PTT to talk to the ATC controller, even if we are using offline voice model for everything, PTT still deducts from the transmission time.  However, it deducts a lot less from the transmission time and as some people have mentioned, using an offline voice model for everything and just using PTT, there may be enough transmission time credit to last for several months or perhaps a few years depending on your PTT usage (this is not confirmed yet, hopefully Beyond ATC can give concrete numbers on how much transmission time PTT deducts for every minute of PTT that you use).

7 hours ago, Cpt_Piett said:

Thanks, this makes sense. Still somewhat confused as I don't see any option in the interface for not using PTT i.e. just using key commands (like e.g. FSHud). 

I think PTT is similar to VATSIM when you assign a button on your joystick (or assign a key on your keyboard), such that when you push that button or push that key, it allows you to talk to the VATSIM controller. If you don't push that button, whatever you say isn't heard by the VATSIM controller.

Anyways, that's what I assume PTT means for Beyond ATC.  When you push the PTT button, the Beyond ATC servers can receive your voice command (of course, you also have to say something in addition to pushing the button).

1 hour ago, anden145 said:

I'm sorry, but I don't understand your logic regarding that this is a 'subscription'. It isn't. You pay as you go. Do you also see filling gas in your car, as a subscription, then?

It's called Sarcasm !

That is why I never responded any further 

29 minutes ago, abrams_tank said:

I think PTT is similar to VATSIM when you assign a button on your joystick (or assign a key on your keyboard), such that when you push that button or push that key, it allows you to talk to the VATSIM controller. If you don't push that button, whatever you say isn't heard by the VATSIM controller.

Anyways, that's what I assume PTT means for Beyond ATC.  When you push the PTT button, the Beyond ATC servers can receive your voice command (of course, you also have to say something in addition to pushing the button).

That's my interpretation as well. I'm not interested in the PTT feature though, so hoping there's a non-PTT alternative. Which apparently there is, based on responses in this thread. 

34 minutes ago, abrams_tank said:

And by using PTT to talk to the ATC controller, even if we are using offline voice model for everything, PTT still deducts from the transmission time. 

I think you're right about this. Quote from their website below: 

Quote

If I have both Voice Models set to Offline, will push to talk functions still work?

Yes. Push to talk functions take up a small amount of Transmission Time. Much smaller amounts compared to any of the voices. But they work with any voice model.

...

15 minutes ago, RJC68 said:

It's called Sarcasm !

I really think sarcasm should be banned on Avsim, as it runs the risk of offending serious simmers™. 

 

Edited February 22, 20242 yr by Cpt_Piett

7 hours ago, RJC68 said:

I fully understand the free voices require no further investment but there is a good chance people will try the premium voice packs and find them way better and then get sucked in to paying for them each month

Absolutely. I am a little surprised that everybody now seems to be wanting to go for the offline voices because they are affordable. Wasn't all the hype about the premium voices and all the different world wide accents? Would there have been any of the hype if BATC would have released their first promo videos with the offline voices only - which sound roughly as good or as bad as those of PF3, FSHUD, or Cereprocs SAPI voices?

And of course BATC do not offer a real subscription in the sense that you pay a fixed price per month and can use as many premium voice transmissions as you like. Imagine they did. Based on an average number of monthly flights per user of say 20-30 that would have been in the range of 100$ per month for a premium subscription. Imagine the outrage. They cleverly circumvented that by bringing on their complex pricing model.

But if you do the math you realize that you will end up in that range of 100$ monthly if you go for the premium voices with all the worldwide accents and you are an avid simmer who makes a flight almost daily. And eventually the premium voices is what sets BATC apart from all we had before. Unfortunately it will not really be feasible for the average guy to use BATC that way it was initially promoted. Hopefully those premium voices will see a massive price drop over time.

 

Edited February 22, 20242 yr by RALF9636

12 minutes ago, Cpt_Piett said:

That's my interpretation as well. I'm not interested in the PTT feature though, so hoping there's a non-PTT alternative. Which apparently there is, based on responses in this thread. 

I think you're right about this. Quote from their website below: 

...

I really think sarcasm should be banned on Avsim, as it runs the risk of offending serious simmers™. 

 

Currently have missile lock on The Executor, Now where did I put the fire button 🤣

35 minutes ago, RALF9636 said:

Absolutely. I am a little surprised that everybody now seems to be wanting to go for the offline voices because they are affordable. Wasn't all the hype about the premium voices and all the different world wide accents? Would there have been any of the hype if BATC would have released there first promo videos with the offline voices only - which sound roughly as good or as bad as those of PF3, FSHUD, or Cereprocs SAPI voices?

And of course BATC do not offer a real subscription in the sense that you pay a fixed price per month and can use as many premium voice transmissions as you like. Imagine they did. Based on an average number of monthly flights per user of say 20-30 that would have been in the range of 100$ per month for a premium subscription. Imagine the outrage. They cleverly circumvented that by bringing on their complex pricing model.

But if you do the math you realize that you will end up in that range of 100$ monthly if you go for the premium voices with all the worldwide accents and you are an avid simmer who makes a flight almost daily. And eventually the premium voices is what sets BATC apart from all we had before. Unfortunately it will not really be feasible for the average guy to use BATC that way it was initially promoted. Hopefully those premium voices will see a massive price drop over time.

 

Unless the cost of using AI voices with different accents comes down a lot in the future, I don't think there will be a really cheap alternative unless Microsoft gets involved and adds it in MSFS 2024, MSFS 2028, etc.

It looks like the big companies like Google, Microsoft, Apple, etc, control the AI space. So I can see why it costs Beyond ATC so much money, to offer different regional accents. You need to be a big company with a big budget to be able to offer the latest AI services.

And I assume the companies that can do AI for cheap because they already own the technology are the big companies that I mentioned: Google, Microsoft, Apple.  Fortunately for us, Microsoft happens to be behind MSFS.  We are quite lucky that MSFS is allowing us to stream the entire world, including photogrammetry, for free as our purchase for MSFS. If they charged a subscription fee to stream the entire world and the photogrammetry, I made a thread about it and some of us would pay $5 USD to $10 USD a month for such a service. But we have gotten it for free for almost 4 years of MSFS.

So I am glad that Microsoft is backing MSFS because we are getting such a good deal for the price we paid, especially if you paid for MSFS back in August of 2020 and you have been using it until now. Now if we can convince Jorg to add proper voice recognition ATC for MSFS 2024, I think Microsoft could afford to offer all the different regional and premium accents for free in MSFS 2024/2028, that Beyond ATC is charging for, because Microsoft probably already owns that technology. Oh yeah, Microsoft also partially owns OpenAi, the company behind ChatGPT, so if we want advanced AI ATC based on ChatGPT, Microsoft can use their leverage with OpenAI to make that free in any ATC overhaul too!

Edited February 22, 20242 yr by abrams_tank

34 minutes ago, RALF9636 said:

Absolutely. I am a little surprised that everybody now seems to be wanting to go for the offline voices because they are affordable. Wasn't all the hype about the premium voices and all the different world wide accents? Would there have been any of the hype if BATC would have released there first promo videos with the offline voices only - which sound roughly as good or as bad as those of PF3, FSHUD, or Cereprocs SAPI voices?

For me, the hype has been about the implementation of AI traffic control outside of the (terrible) default. In addition to this, the phraseology seems decent. I think of voice quality as an added bonus. However, I will say this: the offline option is much better compared to FSHud! Half of the time I cannot decipher the instructions and need to resort to the text. Not to mention compared to default ATC which atm seem to have the same voice handling ATC globally!

What remains to be seen is the quality of things like vectoring, being able to fly published procedures with realistic ATC responses, AI separation from user, the implementation of holds, etc etc etc. 

Apart from this, I'm really curious when the product will release. My guess is before summer. 

Edited February 22, 20242 yr by Cpt_Piett

1 minute ago, abrams_tank said:

Unless the cost of using AI voices with different accents comes down a lot in the future, I don't think there will be a really cheap alternative unless Microsoft gets involved and adds it in MSFS 2024, MSFS 2028, etc.

It looks like the big companies like Google, Microsoft, Apple, etc, control the AI space. So I can see why it costs Beyond ATC so much money, to offer different regional accents. You need to be a big company with a big budget to be able to offer the latest AI services.

And I assume the companies that can do AI for cheap because they already own the technology are the big companies that I mentioned: Google, Microsoft, Apple.  Fortunately for us, Microsoft happens to be behind MSFS.  We are quite lucky that MSFS is allowing us to stream the entire world, including photogrammetry, for free as our purchase for MSFS. If they charged a subscription fee to stream the entire world and the photogrammetry, I made a thread about it and some of us would pay $5 USD to $10 USD a month for such a service. But we have gotten it for free for almost 4 years of MSFS.

So I am glad that Microsoft is backing MSFS because we are getting such a good deal for the price we paid, especially if you paid for MSFS back in August of 2020 and you have been using it until now. Now if we can convince Jorg to add proper voice recognition ATC for MSFS 2024, I think Microsoft could afford to offer all the different regional and premium accents that Beyond ATC is charging for, because Microsoft probably already owns that technology.

I agree. Let's hope Microsoft sees the potential of using MSFS and its ATC system as a demonstration or flagship product for their AI speech and voice technology.

 

17 minutes ago, RJC68 said:

Currently have missile lock on The Executor, Now where did I put the fire button 🤣

Haha my dear friend, you would die before you even find that button - in a rain of ion cannon hell I might add. The Executor cannot be destroyed, not by any mortal entity that is! 

6 minutes ago, RALF9636 said:

I agree. Let's hope Microsoft sees the potential of using MSFS and its ATC system as a demonstration or flagship product for their AI speech and voice technology.

 

For sure, and I just realized some AI ATC software are also using  Chat GPT and I edited my post to add this fact.  So a proper AI ATC overhaul that relies on Chat GPT can be done and included in MSFS 2024 because Microsoft has partial ownership of Open AI, the company behind Chat GPT.

Edited February 22, 20242 yr by abrams_tank