The prompt
Score 10 of 10, Excellent
Use it when You talked your thoughts into a phone or transcription app and need the messy transcript turned into readable text that still says what you said.
- {{tool}}
- {{destination}}
- {{reader}}
- {{transcript}}
- {{terms}}
Full prompt and why it works
Prompt
Turn the transcript below into clean written text. I dictated it into {{tool}}, and it will become {{destination}}, read by {{reader}}. Transcript: """ {{transcript}} """ Words the transcription may have got wrong (names, product terms, acronyms), with the correct spelling: {{terms}} Clean it up: - Remove filler and false starts ("um", "so basically", "wait, let me say that again") and repeated sentences, keeping the version I settled on. - Where I corrected myself while speaking ("Tuesday, no, Wednesday"), keep only the correction. - Fix punctuation, paragraphs and obvious mishearings, using the term list above. - Put my points in a sensible order if I jumped around, under short headings only if the text runs past about 300 words. Keep my words and meaning. This is a clean-up, not a rewrite: the result should read like me on a good day, only tidier. Do not add facts, examples, reasons or conclusions I did not say, and do not soften or strengthen any opinion. The result will usually be a quarter to a half shorter than the transcript. After the text, add a list headed "Check these" with every place where you were not sure what I said, a word may be misheard, or a number or name might be wrong, quoting the transcript each time. For example: "'the Q3 review with Jen's team': is 'Jen' right?" If a passage makes no sense, keep my words in square brackets in the text and add it to the list rather than guessing what I meant.
Variables
- {{tool}}
- What you dictated into, for example "my phone's voice memo app".
- {{destination}}
- What the text will become, for example "an email to my team" or "notes for a report".
- {{reader}}
- Who will read it, for example "my manager" or "only me".
- {{transcript}}
- The transcript, exactly as the app produced it.
- {{terms}}
- Names and terms the app may have misheard, with correct spellings, or "none".
Why it works
- What to avoid. It is a clean-up, not a rewrite: no added facts and no change to the strength of an opinion, so the text still says what you said.
- Background facts. A list of names and terms lets it fix the mishearings transcription apps make most often, the proper nouns.
- If unsure. Every uncertain word, name or number is quoted in a "Check these" list, and a passage that makes no sense stays in brackets rather than being guessed.