Paid to free solutions for the research world’s most frustrating task

Transcribing is THE WORST… just the worst. If we had a nickel for every time someone at a conference talked to us about the perils of audio and video transcription…well, we would be very rich. But, since it is rare for anyone to actually give us nickels for these interactions, we decided not to purchase our own company yacht (just yet) and instead chose to write a blog that might help ease the woes of transcription via the power of software…and no, it’s not our software. Well…not entirely.

Best case scenario?

Sometimes, transcribing everything for a qualitative data analysis is not really necessary. When this is the case, we recommend that you first try excerpting and coding only the necessary tidbits.  In Dedoose you can excerpt and apply codes to a video or audio stream directly. Then your research assistant (or you – with your research assistant hat on) can transcribe the audio right inside Dedoose for only the pieces of media that have a chance of being used in your study (that which you excerpted and tagged).

The other scenarios… Yet, sometimes we fall into dreadful times…times when we have to transcribe our entire interview.  Before bringing out the old transcribing pedals, or playing the same five seconds of media 20 times to get half a line on the page, think about these options instead.

Find out our solutions and more in our article here!

Other ideas?

Are there any other software services you have used that you suggest we try? We are always looking for suggestions for our users. Leave us a comment with your thoughts.