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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

#361

Post by Gud »

mikepalmer wrote: post #347

What if we take AI out of the equation. Should the voice actress who voiced Sky (call her A) be unable to do any voice work because she sounds too much like SJ? How about if the production company that made "Her" wants to make "Her 2". SJ declines the voice work. Are they not allowed to hire A to do the voice work? They ask SJ again but she still declines. They make the movie with A. Was it bad form? Just trying to f…

Why would we take A.I. out of the equation?

Presumably, the production company and Scarlet Johansson would have it in their contract what to do in case she doesn’t want to act in a sequel.

No contract exists between OpenAI and Scarlet Johansson.

Re: Sam Altman is showing us who he really is

#362

Post by sillysaurusx »

pests wrote: post #359
sillysaurusx wrote: post #312

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They said so, and it’s what I would have done. I have no reason not to believe them. Unfortunately a commenter pointed out that there’s legal precedent for protecting people’s voices from commercial usage specifically (thanks to a court case from four decades ago), so I probably wouldn’t have tried this. The cost of battling it out in the legal system is outweighed by the coolness factor of replicating Her. I persona…

Do you always believe everything a corporation tells you? If so, I have a bridge you might be interested in buying

No. But in this particular case, there are two factors that make that irrelevant for me. One, I would have made their same mistake. (If I was Sam, I too would have found it a really cool idea to make GPT have the voice of Her, and I too would not have realized there was one dumb court case from the 80s standing in the way of that.)

Two, it’s bogus that conceptually this isn’t allowed. I’m already anti-IP — I think that IP is a tool that corporations wield to prevent us from using "their" ideas, not to protect us from being exploited as workers. And now this is yet another thing we’re Not Allowed To Do. Great, that sounds like a wonderful world, just peachy. Next time maybe we’ll stop people from monetizing the act of having fun at all, and then the circle of restrictions will be complete.

Or, another way of putting it: poor Scarlett, whatever will she do? Her voice is being actively exploited by a corporation. Oh no.

In reality, she’s rich, powerful, and will be absolutely fine. She’d get over it. The sole reason that she’s being allowed to act like a bully is because the law allows her to (just barely, in this case, but there is one legal precedent) and everyone happens to hate or fear OpenAI, so people love rooting for their downfall and calling Sam an evil sociopath.

Someone, please, make me a moral, ethical argument why what they did here was wrong. I’m happy to change my mind on this. Name one good reason that they shouldn’t be allowed to replicate Her. It would’ve been cool as fuck, and sometimes it feels like I’m the only one who thinks so, other than OpenAI.

Re: Sam Altman is showing us who he really is

#364

Post by FireBeyond »

kaiwen1 wrote: post #104

There are many people with voices similar to Scarlett Johansson's. If SJ is unwilling to be a voice actor for OpenAi, then why should OpenAI not find a similar voice and use that instead? SJ certainly does not have a monopoly on all voices similar to hers. Anyone in possession of such a voice has the same right as SJ to monetize it. And someone did in fact exercise that right. If you compare the Sky voice to SJ's, th…

> OpenAI's mistake was caving to SJ. ... If SJ sued, they could simply prove another voice actor was used and make the legitimate argument that SJ doesn't have a monopoly on voices similar to hers.

Or... hear me out... maybe they couldn't prove that, which is why they caved. Caved within a day or so of her lawyers asking "So if it's not SJ's voice, whose is it?"

Re: Sam Altman is showing us who he really is

#365

Post by m463 »

miohtama wrote: post #14
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…

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 law doesn't allow impersonation.

Re: Sam Altman is showing us who he really is

#366

Post by zemo »

wvenable wrote: post #316
zemo wrote: post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you’re using “he loves the movie” as some sort of defense, when the movie is a pretty standard sci fi cautionary tale. You know the saying: sci-fi author: I wrote about the Torment Nexus as a cautionary tale tech bros: Finally we have built the Torment Nexus from beloved sci fi story “Do not build the Torment Nexus” Enjoying a story is not justification for recreating any artifact that occurs within the story. Her is…

This is real life not fiction. Perhaps we shouldn't crucify people for this sort of vague association.

there’s a huge gulf between saying “I think that guy is wrong” on a web forum and sentencing them to death in an extremely public and slow and painful manner. Nobody is being crucified here. It is intellectually dishonest to see criticism as crucifixion.

Re: Sam Altman is showing us who he really is

#368

Post by klyrs »

hluska wrote: post #331
klyrs wrote: post #286

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually, yes, he does. https://www.weirdal.com/archives/faq/

That says he asks for permission. His new song would generate songwriter credits and they’re paid out totally differently from regular royalties. Is that what you mean by him paying for rights?

Rereading your comment, I see that my answer rather falls short of your question. I don't claim to know anything about Weird Al beyond what he wrote on that page.

Re: Sam Altman is showing us who he really is

#369

Post by WalterBright »

starttoaster wrote: post #353
WalterBright wrote: post #348

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Luddites said the same thing about textile machinery.

I already kind of replied to this rebuttal in advance in my first comment that you replied to. But I’ll refute it again a second way. Textile machinery impacted a very specific sector of work. We’re talking here about an advancement in technology threatening to substitute the creativity of humans one day. With textile machinery, other technological advancements eventually created new jobs which helped to displace the…

The US cannot suppress AI. There's a lot of other countries which would love to pick up the AI flag if we drop it, and then they'll bury us.

I've used AI in my programming work. After you get used to it, you see its limitations. It's not that clever, it's mostly mush. It's better than stackoverflow, though :-/

I've seen AI written articles, and they're pretty much drivel. Of course, most articles are drivel anyway, but the AI ones seem to have a peculiar drivelness about them that I recognize but cannot really describe.

I view it as simply removing some of the drudgery of my work, just like textile machines removed much of the drudgery of making cloth.

What I fear about AI is not their economic uses, but their use in warfare. Do you want a terminator drone hunting you? I sure don't.

Re: Sam Altman is showing us who he really is

#370

Post by tasuki »

dclowd9901 wrote: post #226
hu3 wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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.

The point is still salient. People who don’t have Wikipedia links will be forgotten. Though I guess maybe that’s always been true.

Your legacy can continue as part of the AI trained on your output.

What would you prefer? Would you want people to remember your name? Your face? Your voice? Which people? How often should they have to remember you? For how many thousands of years?

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