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Sam Altman is showing us who he really is

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Re: Sam Altman is showing us who he really is

#131

Post by frankacter »

LeonB wrote: post #93
miohtama wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are hundreds of people with similar voices. If any voice actor can pull the same accent than Ms. Johansson, it should be fair game, as long it was the original training material? Voices cannot be copyrighted or be exclusive, although I am sure Hollywood will try to copyright them in some point.

In back to the future II, Crispin Glover didn’t sign up to be George McFly so they used facial prosthetics and impersonation to continue the George McFly character. He sued Universal, and reportedly settled for $760,000. Example article on the topic - https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/business-news/bac...

While not defending OpenAI or Altman, the caveat here is that this was a voice actor using their natural voice, not an actor impersonating scarlett johansson.

Setting a precedent that if your natural voice sounds similar to a more famous actor precludes you from work would be a terrible precedent to set.

Re: Sam Altman is showing us who he really is

#132

Post by z7 »

jannyfer wrote: post #80
imgabe wrote: post #46

Just so I understand correctly, the sneaky, diabolical, psychopathic behavior we're talking about here is ... making a voice that sounds like a celebrity's voice? We're not talking about poisoning babies or dumping toxic waste in a river, right? The reason we're supposed to consider Sam Altman a villain of unparalleled magnitude is that he used a voice that sounded like a celebrity and she got mad about it. Correct?

Incorrect. It’s the lying about it part.

What lie are you referring to?

Re: Sam Altman is showing us who he really is

#133

Post by hu3 »

malfist wrote: post #75
WalterBright wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm happy to contribute to the general knowledge. It's better than being forgotten and having no impact.

Oh you will be forgotten. All your knowledge will come from some trademarked AI bot and you won't even get a linkback

> Oh you will be forgotten.

Not your parent comenter but please allow me to enlighten you.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Bright

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D_(programming_language)

When in doubt, always double-check who you're replying to in HN. We are lucky to have many great minds around.

Re: Sam Altman is showing us who he really is

#135

Post by Lerc »

lenerdenator wrote: post #60
panarky wrote: post #6

Altman would have us believe it's all just an innocent misunderstanding but without actually saying so: "We cast the voice actor behind Sky’s voice before any outreach to Ms. Johansson." Is he trying to suggest the company did not try to make the voice sound like her without her permission? The statement sounds like it's written by a lawyer to be technically true while implying something that is actually false. These…

If the voice actor was cast... why bother reaching out to ScarJo? Like, do you want to pay her fee, Sam? Because the general idea is to not pay the fee. Which is why you probably cast the voice actor before reaching out to Johansson.

A potential answer to that is liability protection even when you feel like you are legally in the clear. It is still worth paying a sum to avoid a lawsuit you think you will win.

An example of this is Weird Al pays for the rights to things that are probably ok under fair use parody protection. Paying for the rights removes the possibily of a challenge.

Re: Sam Altman is showing us who he really is

#136

Post by wvenable »

tengbretson wrote: post #15

I honestly wouldn't have even thought they sounded all that similar were it not for openai themselves courting comparisons to the movie Her.

If listen to them back to back (Scarlett from Her and Sky) they aren't similar at all. Scarlett has a distinctive raspiness to her voice that entirely doesn't exist in Sky. Sky isn't doing an impression of Scarlett.

However, they both sound like AIs because Scarlett is playing that role and so is OpenAI's voice app.

Re: Sam Altman is showing us who he really is

#137

Post by __loam »

s1k3s wrote: post #35

I love how we went from questioning copyright & licensing to "GPT vs Google, which one is better". To every artist or engineer out there who contributed to the general knowledge: you lost, everything you've ever done to help other people is now part of the models and there's nothing you can do to take it back. What even happened to the copyright strikes artists were supposed to bring up against these AI companies? Th…

There's currently like 10 lawsuits against generative AI companies that are working through the courts including the one from Sarah Andersen, Kelly McKernan, and Karla Ortiz, one from Getty Images, one from the Author's Guild, and one from the New York Times. It should be shocking to nobody that lawsuits take time to litigate, and until the court settles the questions at hand, Open AI and its ilk are operating in a legal gray area.

Re: Sam Altman is showing us who he really is

#138

Post by saalweachter »

dotnet00 wrote: post #63
miohtama wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are hundreds of people with similar voices. If any voice actor can pull the same accent than Ms. Johansson, it should be fair game, as long it was the original training material? Voices cannot be copyrighted or be exclusive, although I am sure Hollywood will try to copyright them in some point.

I think the issue is intent. It's fine if two voices happen to be similar. But it becomes a problem if you're explicitly trying to mimic someone's likeness in a way that is not obviously fair use (eg parody). If they reached out to Johansson first and then explicitly attempted to mimic her despite her refusal, it might be a problem. If the other voice was chosen first, and had nothing to do with sounding the same as…

Isn't there also something about an actor's voice versus an actor's performance?

Eg, James Earl Jones performing Darth Vader vs Mufasa vs Terence Mann are three different things.

Re: Sam Altman is showing us who he really is

#139

Post by lacker »

infecto wrote: post #111

Not sure why so many people get so emotional and project so much. Let the courts decide. I do think they should not have pulled it so quickly, why go through all this effort with this expected outcome. Not a good look.

I think pulling the voice right away is the right strategy. Even if they fight and lose a court case, losing the rights to the Sky voice, will there really be a lot of damages just for including it in a demo video? Probably not. And what's the upside of fighting? Do you really want a voice that sounds like Scarlett Johansson and reminds people of this whole thing? OpenAI should just compromise, take down the voice, move on, and focus on making something people want.
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