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Radio host David Greene says Google's NotebookLM tool stole his voice

washingtonpost.com

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Re: Radio host David Greene says Google's NotebookLM tool stole his voice

#81

Post by [deleted] »

csallen wrote: post #45
disposition2 wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Probably an unpopular opinion on this forum where everyone is considering can something be done vs should something be done, but it sounds like theft to me. But I am also very anti-AI in the artistic space, because if it weren’t for humans freely providing so much artistic content, we wouldn’t have this outcome. And I believe the only end result will be less humans openly sharing knowledge, because some heavily money…

It's not theft, it's copying. Two different words, with two different meanings, and different legality, for very good reason. You can only steal things that can be taken away, which is why theft is bad, because it deprives the original owner of something they once had. Copying does not directly deprive anyone of anything. In fact it just adds more value to the world, and makes it more available to more people. Nobody…

[deleted]

Re: Radio host David Greene says Google's NotebookLM tool stole his voice

#82

Post by reaperducer »

jader201 wrote: post #80
reactordev wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You absolutely can copy that, it’s called voice cloning and you can do it on as little as a few seconds of audio. Once cloned, you can generate audio with that voice, saying whatever you want it to.

To be clear, I mean someone can’t file a lawsuit against someone else for sounding like them. Of course you can have an AI target someone else’s voice. My point is that unless there is evidence it was intentional, it’s silly to claim that just because it sounds similar to a human’s voice, that means it must’ve been intentional.

I mean someone can’t file a lawsuit against someone else for sounding like them.

But they did. It's literally what the article, and this thread are about.

Re: Radio host David Greene says Google's NotebookLM tool stole his voice

#83

Post by Unearned5161 »

neural_thing wrote: post #69

People are REALLY bad at distinguishing voices. For every AI voice, there are tons of people claiming it's theirs. Well known problem for TTS.

People are bad at distinguishing strange voices in a lineup, yes. That is, anyone in this thread who hasn't heard much of either the NotebookLM or Greene's voice would be a terrible witness.

However, the equation changes considerably when the voice becomes familiar. You can imagine it like going from CPU to an ASIC. The brain is rather good at telling when a voice is your friend or not, the evolutionary pressure should be clear. Therefore, the people most qualified to speak on this matter will be first and foremost Greene and his podcast fans. It's a matter of exposure.

Re: Radio host David Greene says Google's NotebookLM tool stole his voice

#84

Post by Unearned5161 »

There seems to be a lot of confusion in this thread around the human mind's processing of voice sounds.

As with most (all?) things we do, exposure is king. This is how we don't die from trying to process infinite dimensional reality. The brain compresses, it prunes. Things seem similar if you don't have much need to distinguish them.

Unless you've listened to hours of either NotebookLM or Greene, you simply won't be able to participate in the distinguishing of these voices with much ability.

Re: Radio host David Greene says Google's NotebookLM tool stole his voice

#85

Post by qingcharles »

I know someone who is one of the top-rated voiceover artists on Fiverr. Their voice appeared on a video recently I heard and it was definitely cloned from them (as it was not a project they would have worked on).

It's so easy to do now. You can just grab your favorite voiceover artist's demo reel and clone it from there. The chances of getting caught are slim, and what is the (poorly paid) artist going to do? Most of them will lack the resources to fund a protracted court case to sue some anonymous users in Tajikistan making AI slop videos en masse.

Re: Radio host David Greene says Google's NotebookLM tool stole his voice

#86

Post by jader201 »

reaperducer wrote: post #82
jader201 wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be clear, I mean someone can’t file a lawsuit against someone else for sounding like them. Of course you can have an AI target someone else’s voice. My point is that unless there is evidence it was intentional, it’s silly to claim that just because it sounds similar to a human’s voice, that means it must’ve been intentional.

I mean someone can’t file a lawsuit against someone else for sounding like them. But they did. It's literally what the article, and this thread are about.

This is about an AI sounding like a human, not a human sounding like a human.

Re: Radio host David Greene says Google's NotebookLM tool stole his voice

#87

Post by noduerme »

godelski wrote: post #73
rectang wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It doesn't matter if the voice is a perfect facsimile — it only matters whether a court can be persuaded that the result is derivative. As the article notes, the AI doesn't even have to be trained on Greene's voice for him to have a case. > Grimmelmann said Greene doesn’t necessarily have to show definitively that Google trained NotebookLM on his voice to have a case, or even that the voice is 100 percent identical t…

In other words, can you guess who someone is impersonating even if their impersonation isn't a perfect simulation? There's a lot of characteristics to people's voices. Tons of people impersonate Trump purely through cadence. Same with Obama. How many singers impersonate Tom Waits?

>> How many singers impersonate Tom Waits?

Only the pack-a-day smokers, and we're always a dying breed.

Re: Radio host David Greene says Google's NotebookLM tool stole his voice

#88

Post by teekert »

hinkley wrote: post #32
teekert wrote: post #7

I listen to some Jupiter Broadcasting podcasts. The main host (Chris Fisher) regularly pops up in NotebookLLM content, with his voice. Sometimes it just jumps in, and then after some time out again. It’s usually a pretty perfect imitation, I can’t hear the difference . Edit, here an older piece, there have been many since: [0], it’s the 3rd voice that enters the NotebookLLM clip so it takes a minute before it comes i…

I don’t agree with this one, which puts me at one yes and one no. But it is always possible that this is what Chris sounds like in his own head. Nobody listening to audio will hear it the way he does.

I can't image we're listening to the same voice then, the piece starts with an intro, then the NotebookLLM part starts with a male, then a female, and then the cloned voice enters.

But as said, this is an old example, there have been many since (which I am too lazy to look up) that are also very clear voice clones.

Re: Radio host David Greene says Google's NotebookLM tool stole his voice

#89

Post by teekert »

oniony wrote: post #11
teekert wrote: post #7

I listen to some Jupiter Broadcasting podcasts. The main host (Chris Fisher) regularly pops up in NotebookLLM content, with his voice. Sometimes it just jumps in, and then after some time out again. It’s usually a pretty perfect imitation, I can’t hear the difference . Edit, here an older piece, there have been many since: [0], it’s the 3rd voice that enters the NotebookLLM clip so it takes a minute before it comes i…

Where no limbs are left behind.

What does this mean?

Re: Radio host David Greene says Google's NotebookLM tool stole his voice

#90

Post by teekert »

tantalor wrote: post #25

Compare for yourself. David Greene: https://youtu.be/xYxQrLp4MQk NotebookLM: https://youtu.be/AR4dRtzFvxM I think he just has "podcast guy" voice. It's pretty generic.

I also have a hard time hearing it in this example, your second example is just the default NotebookLLM male. But there are much better examples of NotebookLLM cloning voices out there. See my other comments.

Btw, are you sure that is the part David Greene is upset about? The NotebookLLM hosts will vary their voice, and jump into and out of different voices in a glitchy manner sometimes.

Why is everybody so inclined to defend NotebookLLM here? I've heard Chris Fisher and other Jupiter Broadcasting hosts mimicked , but also leo Laporte (from TWIT) for example. It's obvious it is trained on a lot of open podcasting material and clones a voice every now and then.

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