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How the voices for ChatGPT were chosen

openai.com

11–20 of 78 posts

Re: How the voices for ChatGPT were chosen

#11
post #6

Am I the only one that really dislikes these overly perky voices? And the one they used for the demo was GOD AWFUL. If this is what the future sounds like… idk. I was hoping for a calm, neutral and not eager assistant with a little class. A little Jarvis maybe? Something calm and easy on the ears. These all sounded to me like people auditioning for a role in film and television or something.

You're not alone. But it should be an easy fix with voice cloning proceeding as fast as it is.

I’m hoping. That’s a good point.

It really sounded like people from central casting. The fact that is was exactly that is hilarious to me.

Your point is well advised!

Re: How the voices for ChatGPT were chosen

#13
post #3

Berlin famously casted a gender neutral voice for public transport announcements. It would be nice if OpenAI would have done that too. At least for one of the options. Computers better not have genders imo

I wouldn't be surprised if the person voicing those announcements would be more happy to be called female than gender neutral.

Re: How the voices for ChatGPT were chosen

#14
post #6

Am I the only one that really dislikes these overly perky voices? And the one they used for the demo was GOD AWFUL. If this is what the future sounds like… idk. I was hoping for a calm, neutral and not eager assistant with a little class. A little Jarvis maybe? Something calm and easy on the ears. These all sounded to me like people auditioning for a role in film and television or something.

Google did a much better job here and everyone glossed over

Re: How the voices for ChatGPT were chosen

#15
post #3

Berlin famously casted a gender neutral voice for public transport announcements. It would be nice if OpenAI would have done that too. At least for one of the options. Computers better not have genders imo

Why?

Because assigning genders to computers makes as much sense as giving your toaster a name, it’s 2024, so why not keep the gender out of it?

The why question is easily answered if you see how many negative reactions their choice of voice caused. A gender-neutral voice would have just avoided annoying a certain percentage of the population, including me.

I'm happy if advertising stops hitting the sexy/cliched stereotypes.

Sometimes the Guardian goes a bit far but OpenAI could have avoided this kind of article: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/article/2024/may/1...

(Edit: I guess I was being slightly inflammatory with my first sentence. I think the default voice should be gender-neutral and then let the user choose what makes them happy. I don't think it was clever of OpenAI to use a sexy female as the default voice in their demos as evidenced by us having this discussion)

Re: How the voices for ChatGPT were chosen

#16

Would it be possible to use prompting to change aspects of the voice output? Will the voice respond angrily if you ask to act an angry character in a play?

Yes. This was a big part of the GPT-4o demos. But likely they've specifically fine-tune it not to show negative emotions in a serious fashion.

Re: How the voices for ChatGPT were chosen

#18
post #6

Am I the only one that really dislikes these overly perky voices? And the one they used for the demo was GOD AWFUL. If this is what the future sounds like… idk. I was hoping for a calm, neutral and not eager assistant with a little class. A little Jarvis maybe? Something calm and easy on the ears. These all sounded to me like people auditioning for a role in film and television or something.

I would like something more David Attenborough-ish.

Re: How the voices for ChatGPT were chosen

#19
post #3

Berlin famously casted a gender neutral voice for public transport announcements. It would be nice if OpenAI would have done that too. At least for one of the options. Computers better not have genders imo

I'd love a glados voice or a extremely synthesized one 80s style. I'm using an open one for now, and I think it's very appropriate.
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