Yahoo! launches voice recognition search for smartphones

Yahoo! is launching a mobile voice recognition search service called oneSearch on 80 phones in the UK, including the iPhone.

oneSearch, which allows users to speak their requests through their handsets, comes with support in eight languages.

Query results on oneSearch are returned in categories rather than links.

A recent study by the Internet Advertising Bureau and PricewaterhouseCoopers found that mobile adspend was up 99.2% year on year in 2008, hitting £28.6 million (see IAB: UK mobile adspend hits £28.6m in 2008).

The research showed that paid-for-search advertising on the mobile internet accounted for £14.4 million, 50.2% of all mobile advertising spend in 2008.