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OpenAI didn’t copy Scarlett Johansson’s voice for ChatGPT, records show

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Re: OpenAI didn’t copy Scarlett Johansson’s voice for ChatGPT, records show

#251

Post by bryanrasmussen »

jorvi wrote: post #182
serial_dev wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know, to me, it's just sounds like they know how to cover all their bases. To me, it sounds like they had the idea to make their AI sound like "her". For the initial version, they had a voice actor that sounds like the movie, as a proof of concept. They still liked it, so it was time to contact the real star. In the end, it's not just the voice, it would have been the brand, just imagine the buzz they would h…

> In the end, someone probably felt like it's a bit too dodgy as it resemblance was uncanny What if it wasn’t a computer voice model but rather a real-life voice actress that you could pay a few cents to try to imitate Scarlett Johansson’s voice as best as she could? That’s effectively what’s happening here, and it isn’t illegal. It guess it also leads to the bigger question: do celebrities own their particular frequ…

>guess it also leads to the bigger question

people are allowed to sound like other people. But if you go to actor 1 and say we want to use your voice for our product, and then they say no, and then you go to actor 2 and tell them I want you to sound like actor 1 for our product, and then you release a statement hey you know that popular movie by actor 1 that just used their voice in a context extremely reminiscent of our product?!? Well, listen to what we got: (actor 2 voice presented)

Then you may run into legal problems.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midler_v._Ford_Motor_Co.

on edit: assuming that reports I am reading that the actress used for the voicework claimed not to have been instructed to sound like Her vocal work it sounds like it is probably not likely that a suit would be successful.

Re: OpenAI didn’t copy Scarlett Johansson’s voice for ChatGPT, records show

#252

Post by eynsham »

moralestapia wrote: post #220
omnicognate wrote: post #171

Comments full of people reading the headline and assuming that what OpenAI did here is fine because it's a different actress, but that's not how "Right of publicity" (*) laws work. The article itself explains that there is significant legal risk here: > Mitch Glazier, the chief executive of the Recording Industry Association of America, said that Johansson may have a strong case against OpenAI if she brings forth a l…

You misunderstand how personality rights work. Called it in the other thread and calling it in this one, there is no wrongdoing on OpenAI's side. Looking/sounding like somebody else (even if its famous) is not prosecutable. Scarlet Johansson has nothing in this case, whether people like it or not. That's the reality.

Who said it was ‘prosecutable’?

Re: OpenAI didn’t copy Scarlett Johansson’s voice for ChatGPT, records show

#253

Post by contrarian1234 »

jonathanstrange wrote: post #246
contrarian1234 wrote: post #120

I think it's really problematic that the government is protecting voice actor's careers. It's like if they disallowed cars on the roads to protect horse carriages. Clearly with the new technology a whole economic sector is gone and irrelevant over night. Now amateurs and small projects can afford to add good sounding voices to their creations. This is good news in the end The same goes for actors and their likenesses…

The vast majority of all voice actors are piss poor, not ultra wealthy celebrities. The ultra wealthy celebrities just happen to be the only ones who could legally defend themselves and can create a media fuzz. You're basically suggesting that it's okay to copy anyone's voice and appearance without ever giving them compensation and without regard to personality rights. That's insane. Even for someone who thinks this…

As long as it's clear it's not actually me and I'm not personally endorsing the product then what is the problem? Here you are talking to OpenAI's system and it's clear Scarlett isn't personally answer you and the answers don't represent her or her views

Re: OpenAI didn’t copy Scarlett Johansson’s voice for ChatGPT, records show

#254

Post by czl »

marcus_holmes wrote: post #235
dragonelite wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Imaging this to be such a legal minefield, can't sell my own voice because a celeb sounds a bit alike as my own voice.

A celeb creates a particular voice personality for a role as an AI in a very successful movie. You create an AI, and "co-incidentally" create a strikingly similar voice personality for your AI. Not a legal minefield, you copied the movie, you owe them. They could have used any accent, any tone, anyone. Literally anyone else. And it would have been fine. But they obviously copied the movie even if they used a differen…

Yes they tried to copy film Her yet the voice ai character in the film you think was original? No other films predate that film with female AI voices? And would the actor have claim on the fictional character they played in the film vs film “owners”?

Re: OpenAI didn’t copy Scarlett Johansson’s voice for ChatGPT, records show

#255

Post by JumpCrisscross »

persnickety wrote: post #242
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> like if they disallowed cars on the roads to protect horse carriages What? Nobody is banning OpenAI from licensing voices. The censure is on, at the very least, using an unlicensed likeness to promote their new products without compensation. (Assuming Sky truly is a clean-room product.) Likeness just became a tradeable product. That wasn't true before. The better analogy is in recognising mineral rights, including…

What makes a likeness a likeness? A measure of similarity? Then I demand all people sounding like me to license their voice from me. A claim that the voice originates from a certain person? Then you don't need any licensing in this case.

> What makes a likeness a likeness?

I'm not sure. Precedented personality rights would be a good place to start [1].

I'd argue for a higher standard of evidence for human-produced voices, Middler v. Ford Motor Co. seems good as any [2]. But a lower burden for synthesised voices, given the difficulty in proving intent and mass producibility of them.

> A claim that the voice originates from a certain person? Then you don't need any licensing in this case

Altman basically claimed as much by tweeting about Her in its context. At that point, he is using her fame to market his products without her permission.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personality_rights

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midler_v._Ford_Motor_Co.

Re: OpenAI didn’t copy Scarlett Johansson’s voice for ChatGPT, records show

#256

Post by jonathanstrange »

contrarian1234 wrote: post #253
jonathanstrange wrote: post #246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The vast majority of all voice actors are piss poor, not ultra wealthy celebrities. The ultra wealthy celebrities just happen to be the only ones who could legally defend themselves and can create a media fuzz. You're basically suggesting that it's okay to copy anyone's voice and appearance without ever giving them compensation and without regard to personality rights. That's insane. Even for someone who thinks this…

As long as it's clear it's not actually me and I'm not personally endorsing the product then what is the problem? Here you are talking to OpenAI's system and it's clear Scarlett isn't personally answer you and the answers don't represent her or her views

That's not what you suggested, though. You said that young talented directors will make movies with an AI-generated Tom Cruise anyway and insinuated that this is what we should allow. That's the opposite of "...being clear that it's not me." By the way, the law already allows all this when it's clear that no particular person is imitated. We're talking about the cases when it's not clear.

Or do you suggest to have different laws for celebrities and poor actors?

Re: OpenAI didn’t copy Scarlett Johansson’s voice for ChatGPT, records show

#257

Post by Ukv »

marcus_holmes wrote: post #228
gnicholas wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Midler case is readily distinguishable. From Wikipedia: > Ford Motor created an ad campaign for the Mercury Sable that specifically was meant to inspire nostalgic sentiments through the use of famous songs from the 1970s sung by their original artists. When the original artists refused to accept, impersonators were used to sing the original songs for the commercials. Midler was asked to sing a famous song of hers…

The actress did impersonate Her though. It's not just a random "voice for your chatbot", it's that particularly breathy, chatty, voice that she performed for the movie. I would agree with you completely if they'd created a completely different voice. Even if they'd impersonated a different famous actress. But it's the fact that Her was about an AI, and this is an AI, and the voices are identical. It's clearly an impe…

> The actress did impersonate Her though.

Did she? The article claims that:

1. Multiple people agree that the casting call mentioned nothing about SJ/her

2. The voice actress claims she was not given instructions to imitate SJ/her

3. The actress's natural voice sounds identical to the AI-generated Sky voice

I don't personally think it's anywhere near "identical" to SJ's voice. It seems most likely to me that they noticed the similarity in concept afterwards and wanted to try to capitalize on it (hence later contacting SJ), opposed to the other way around.

Re: OpenAI didn’t copy Scarlett Johansson’s voice for ChatGPT, records show

#258

Post by moralestapia »

eynsham wrote: post #252
moralestapia wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You misunderstand how personality rights work. Called it in the other thread and calling it in this one, there is no wrongdoing on OpenAI's side. Looking/sounding like somebody else (even if its famous) is not prosecutable. Scarlet Johansson has nothing in this case, whether people like it or not. That's the reality.

Who said it was ‘prosecutable’?

Scarlet Johansson is threatening legal action against OpenAI for this.

Are you not aware of this?

Re: OpenAI didn’t copy Scarlett Johansson’s voice for ChatGPT, records show

#259

Post by z7 »

marcus_holmes wrote: post #228
gnicholas wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Midler case is readily distinguishable. From Wikipedia: > Ford Motor created an ad campaign for the Mercury Sable that specifically was meant to inspire nostalgic sentiments through the use of famous songs from the 1970s sung by their original artists. When the original artists refused to accept, impersonators were used to sing the original songs for the commercials. Midler was asked to sing a famous song of hers…

The actress did impersonate Her though. It's not just a random "voice for your chatbot", it's that particularly breathy, chatty, voice that she performed for the movie. I would agree with you completely if they'd created a completely different voice. Even if they'd impersonated a different famous actress. But it's the fact that Her was about an AI, and this is an AI, and the voices are identical. It's clearly an impe…

How do you explain the many people saying that the voices do not sound especially similar?

"The pitch is kiiiiiind of close, but that's about it. Different cadence, different levels of vocal fry, slightly different accent if you pay close attention. Johansson drops Ts for Ds pretty frequently, Sky pronounces Ts pretty sharply. A linguist could probably break it down better than me and identify the different regions involved."

https://old.reddit.com/r/singularity/comments/1cx24sy/vocal_...

There is also a faction claiming that Sky's voice is more similar to Rashida Jones's than Scarlett Johansson's:

https://old.reddit.com/r/ChatGPT/comments/1cx9t8b/vocal_comp...

Re: OpenAI didn’t copy Scarlett Johansson’s voice for ChatGPT, records show

#260

Post by makeitdouble »

gnicholas wrote: post #216
omnicognate wrote: post #171

Comments full of people reading the headline and assuming that what OpenAI did here is fine because it's a different actress, but that's not how "Right of publicity" (*) laws work. The article itself explains that there is significant legal risk here: > Mitch Glazier, the chief executive of the Recording Industry Association of America, said that Johansson may have a strong case against OpenAI if she brings forth a l…

The Midler case is readily distinguishable. From Wikipedia: > Ford Motor created an ad campaign for the Mercury Sable that specifically was meant to inspire nostalgic sentiments through the use of famous songs from the 1970s sung by their original artists. When the original artists refused to accept, impersonators were used to sing the original songs for the commercials. Midler was asked to sing a famous song of hers…

The order of the events is different, but it still comes down to whether OA had a specific voice in mind when building the chatbot.

By your logic, I could go find a Tim Cook looking and sounding guy, make a promotion video with him praising my new startup, ping Tim Cook to check if by any chance he wouldn't miraculously be willing to do me a favor to avoid me all the trouble in the first place, but still go on and release my video ads without any permission.

"I did all the preparation way before asking the celebrity" wouldn't be a valid defense.

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