.. The difference is that steno is pressing less keys to produce more letters...
There are considerable differences between true steno and my WP shorthand. With steno, it's not just a matter of "pressing fewer keys". With steno the keys are pressed simultaneously, or chorded. With keyboard shorthand, the keystrokes are sequential. This means that physically the steno seems to be doing less work.
This video shows a stenotypist in action. It's in French, but you can still see the fingers pressing the keys simultaneously, rather than in my video, where they are sequential.
On the down side because steno was originally a machine shorthand based upon sounds (like Pitmans pen eg) rather than words, prior to computerisation, the output from the stenotype machine
had to be translated into proper English or "scoped", usually by a specialist editor or "scopist".
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ScopistAs you can see the text on the tape bore no resemblance to the final "expanded" text. This meant that the shorthand had to be "universal", as was pen-based shorthand, so that it could be translated by a third party, even years later. Thus in order to use steno there is literally years of study to acquire the skill (as well as costs of thousands of dollars), whereas with keyboard shorthand it's immediate (and free). The typist or WPO can add their own abbreviations in their own time, while still transcribing non-abbreviated text in full. Because the abbreviations are entered into the computer beforehand (which is now happening with stenotype) the translation is immediate and error free. The same principle is applied in SMS texting on mobile phones, except if I send a message to a friend, I have to assume that they will know what my abbreviations stand for, which can lead to no end of difficulty through misinterpretation. But those people who are adept at using SMS-type abbreviating should find keyboard shorthand quite easy.
I'm rather puzzled that you should find 150 wpm worthy of comment. I worked for many years in various court reporting firms and there were literally dozens of people who were typing at about that speed. None of them was using (my) shorthand, so they were typing everything in full, on QWERTY keyboards. It was how I started out until we shifted from HP Word software to WordPerfect 5.1 for DOS, which is where I began to really develop the shorthand, as well as bring my Maltron in.
In his post, Jack has pointed out that he was working at a ratio of 3:1. That means he takes three minutes to type one minute of audio. The world recognised standard is 4:1, so he's going pretty well. He also mentions "little need to research any terms". My contractual obligation, as I mentioned, is to be 99.9995% accurate. Most stenotypists, on my understanding, work to 97-98%. To obtain my level of accuracy I have to stop typing and search for information, whether it be the name of a street, a type of washing machine, a medical procedure or an illegal chemical substance. I have to be able to find this information quickly, because whilst I'm not typing, the clock is still ticking.
I was assigned to a forensic pathology office for 12 months, doing transcription of post mortem reports, which was 99% standard stuff, although each of the three doctors had their own individual way of describing. After a couple of weeks, by the judicious application of the functions of the word processor, I was able to enter 2-4 keystrokes, and have about 10-15 seconds of audio transcribed in under a second. This calculated out to be 3-4,000 wpm. But nevertheless I still had to listen to it all the way to check that the doctor hadn't said something out of the ordinary. I was able to research the correct spellings etc beforehand so that I was able to do a complete autopsy report in a few minutes.
My experience is that a slower typist who knows everything will do a better, faster, job than a speed freak who doesn't know anything and has to stop and find stuff out all the time or correct errors.
