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Statement from Scarlett Johansson on the OpenAI "Sky" voice

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Re: Statement from Scarlett Johansson on the OpenAI "Sky" voice

#471

Post by throwaway115 »

MBCook wrote: post #440
101008 wrote: post #410

Earlier quoted context omitted.

it could make life better for a lot of people, but training their models on copyright material, which makes life worse for another set of people.

Right. If what they’re doing is so incredibly valuable, just pay for the resources you’re using. If your business model only works if you steal stuff from other people you don’t have a business.

Sounds like you're using the music industry's definition of "steal." Nothing was stolen, because nobody was deprived of the thing.

Re: Statement from Scarlett Johansson on the OpenAI "Sky" voice

#472

Post by warcher »

callalex wrote: post #274
howbadisthat wrote: post #251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Scarlet owns the voice of a stranger that happens to sound like her? That seems absurd. Just find someone who sounds like her, then hire them for the rights to their voice.

It’s really hard to assume in good faith that you are unfamiliar with the concept of impersonation. Just in case: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impersonator There is no doubt that the hired actor was an impersonator, this was explicitly stated by scama himself.

It’s just that her voice by itself is relatively unremarkable. Someone like say, Morgan freeman, or Barack Obama, someone with a distinctive vocal delivery, that’s one thing. Scarlett Johansson, I couldn’t place her voice out of a lineup. I’m sure it’s pleasant I just can’t think of it.

Re: Statement from Scarlett Johansson on the OpenAI "Sky" voice

#473

Post by prepend »

krisoft wrote: post #452
minimaxir wrote: post #351

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suspect that'll be OpenAI's defense.

That is what discovery is for. If this would ever get to that phase. Someone from OpenAi hired the agency who hired the voice talent (or talents) for the voice data. They sent them a brief explaining what they are looking for, followed by a metric ton of correspondence over samples and contracts and such. If anywhere during those written communications anyone wrote “we are looking for a ScarlettJ imitator”, or words…

I recall the basics from my contracts law class that it’s not against the law to hire an impersonator as long as you don’t claim it’s the celebrity.

So it’s legal to hire someone who sounds like SJ. And likely legal to create a model that sounds like her. But there will likely need to be some disclaimer saying it’s not her voice.

I expect that OpenAI’s defense will be something like “We wanted SJ. She said no, so we made a voice that sounded like her but wasn’t her.” It will be interesting to see what happens.

Re: Statement from Scarlett Johansson on the OpenAI "Sky" voice

#474

Post by GrilledChips »

mmcwilliams wrote: post #344
monroewalker wrote: post #299

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> One thing these trained voices make clear is that it's a tts engine generating ChatGPT-4o's speech, same as before. I'm not familiar with the specifics of how AI models work but doesn't the ability from some of the demos rule out what you've said above? Eg. The speeding up and slowing down speech and the sarcasm don't seem possible if TTS was a separate component

I have no special insight into what they're actually doing, but speeding up and slowing down speech have been features of SSML for a long time. If they are generating a similar markup language it's not inconceivable that it would be possible to do what you're describing.

It's also possible that any such enunciation is being hallucinated from the text by the speech model.

AI models exist to make up bullshit that fills a gap. When you have a conversation with any LLM it's merely autocompleting the next few lines of what it thinks is a movie script.

Re: Statement from Scarlett Johansson on the OpenAI "Sky" voice

#475

Post by maxbond »

z7 wrote: post #363
option wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Very obvious bias against OpenAI in the comments here. Possible motives: a) there's a visceral human reaction against anyone extraordinarily successful and powerful (Nietzsche wrote about this). b) resentment for OpenAI's advancements in code generation and its possible impact on the job market. I don't think much of the outrage here is motivated by altruism, it's probably more about siding with whoever opposes your…

I propose the following razor:

Never attribute to jealousy that which can be explained by a difference of perspective.

Jealousy can explain any criticism of anybody. That makes it an epistemic hazard; you can always fall back to it, and you can develop a habit of doing so. And then you have deafened yourself. Any substantive criticisms will be lost on you. As will any opportunity to learn from those you disagree with. Your ideas will be hot house flowers, comfortable and safe in their controlled environment, but unable to contend in the wild. Aspire to weeds.

Re: Statement from Scarlett Johansson on the OpenAI "Sky" voice

#476

Post by willis936 »

callalex wrote: post #264

I think we should all strive to meet the standards of “Weird” Al Yankovic. He set out to do something that was widely hated by a very powerful and litigious sector, and yet after a full career he is widely revered by both the public and the industry. He masterfully sidestepped any problems by adhering to the basic concept of consent while still getting what he wanted 99% of the time.

It worked for Weird Al because he's always had good intentions. If all he ever tried to do was scam people by overselling, fear mongering, saber rattling, and stealing whatever was in reach then it wouldn't have worked out for him. We'll see if OpenAI can last as long as Weird Al.

Re: Statement from Scarlett Johansson on the OpenAI "Sky" voice

#477

Post by muglug »

stavros wrote: post #111

This is the first I've heard of this, but I've used the "Sky" voice extensively and never once thought it sounded like Johansson. Has anyone else noticed a similarity? To me they sound pretty different, Johansson's voice is much more raspy.

There's two different things: the Sky voice they launched last year, as heard here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RcgV2u9Kxh0. The voice actor is the same, but the intonation is fairly flat.

They changed the voice to intone like Scarlett Johansson's character. It's like they changed the song the voice was singing to one that lots of people recognise.

Re: Statement from Scarlett Johansson on the OpenAI "Sky" voice

#478

Post by disqard »

ProjectArcturis wrote: post #449
anon373839 wrote: post #62

Well, that statement lays out a damning timeline: - OpenAI approached Scarlett last fall, and she refused. - Two days before the GPT-4o launch, they contacted her agent and asked that she reconsider. (Two days! This means they already had everything they needed to ship the product with Scarlett’s cloned voice.) - Not receiving a response, OpenAI demos the product anyway, with Sam tweeting “her” in reference to Scarle…

I'm beginning to think this Sam Altman guy isn't so trustworthy.

You beat me to it.

Bon mots apart, he really appears to have an innate capacity for betrayal.

Re: Statement from Scarlett Johansson on the OpenAI "Sky" voice

#479

Post by causality0 »

minimaxir wrote: post #409
causality0 wrote: post #95

I'm sure Jen Taylor would be open to an offer.

Cortana on Windows is indeed already voiced by Jen Taylor. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cortana_(virtual_assistant)

That's what I was referencing. That, and the fact Microsoft has given up on Cortana so she's probably free.

Re: Statement from Scarlett Johansson on the OpenAI "Sky" voice

#480

Post by nvy »

anon373839 wrote: post #62

Well, that statement lays out a damning timeline: - OpenAI approached Scarlett last fall, and she refused. - Two days before the GPT-4o launch, they contacted her agent and asked that she reconsider. (Two days! This means they already had everything they needed to ship the product with Scarlett’s cloned voice.) - Not receiving a response, OpenAI demos the product anyway, with Sam tweeting “her” in reference to Scarle…

It's not possible for me to express the full measure of my disdain for Sam Altman without violating the HN guidelines.
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