Very cool! Amazing work.
Launch HN: Play.ht (YC W23) – Generate and clone voices from 20 seconds of audio
271–280 of 471 posts
Re: Launch HN: Play.ht (YC W23) – Generate and clone voices from 20 seconds of audio
#272Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm unclear as to what your point is, then...
you said: "This sort of technology literally makes it impossible to trust anything electronic." we said: "No, because there is also technology that makes it possible to trust anything electronic with very nearly 100% reliability. But no one uses it" I think your first statement is both technically wrong and generally wrong. Electronic trust is a solved problem...it's just that right now, it's really not as big a deal…
Ahh, I see.
I disagree that electronic trust is a solved problem. It is mathematically solved, yes, but the reason that it isn't widely used is because it's still intrusive and painful to do. A solution that isn't acceptable to the masses isn't an effective solution.
If it could be done in a way that is invisible (like HTTPS, for instance), then it would be ubiquitous. That's the part of the problem space that still needs resolution.
Re: Launch HN: Play.ht (YC W23) – Generate and clone voices from 20 seconds of audio
#273Earlier quoted context omitted.
On the other hand, why shouldn't voice actors benefit from this tech? I can easily imagine a future where AI-generated impersonations are deemed by courts or new legislation to be protected by personality rights. In that world, voice actors could expand their business by offering deeply discounted rates for AI-generated work. Alternatively, if/when tech like Play.ht is consistently good enough, maybe it just becomes…
I'm sure programmers would love to expand their business opportunities by offering deeply discounted rates for creating AI-generated code. No? Then why do you assume that someone else would want to do the same in their profession? As AI-generated content is not protectable under IP law, it's a non-starter for games, film, TV, or music for anything except background filler.
Sure, why not? If you could earn more money and produce more value to society with the same amount of labor, and the legal/regulatory environment supported it, I wouldn't see a reason not to.
If you had a solo contracting business, and the technology existed to fully outsource a development project to AI based on carefully documented requirements, using it would be a cheaper alternative to subcontracting. Rather than writing every line of code by hand, you would transition to becoming an architect, project manager, code reviewer, and QA tester. Now you're one person with the resources and earning potential of an entire development shop.
I have my fair share of complaints about AI coding tools, but that isn't one of them. Maybe the increase in supply would result in a lower average software engineering income, but it wouldn't have to if demand kept pace with supply.
Furthermore, code is more fungible than a person's voice. If someone wants a particular celebrity's voice, that celebrity has a monopoly on it. Thus, it's not obvious that increasing the supply of one's voice acting work would decrease its value. (I suspect the opposite to be the case, until a point of diminishing returns.)
Although the voice acting case has a similar concern; will we get an explosion in new and/or higher-quality media, or will we see a consolidation to a smaller number of well known voice actors taking an outsized amount amount of work? Another issue, if we look beyond impersonation specifically, is that human voices may become marginalized over time in favor of entirely synthetic voices. I imagine that this would start with synthetic voices playing minor roles alongside human/human-impersonated voices, but over time certain synthetic voices would organically become recognizable in their own rights.
Again, I see plenty of concerns with AI in general, but more of a mixed bag than strictly negative, and there isn't anything inherently nefarious about this product in particular.
Personally, I'm optimistic about what society looks like in the long run if humanity proves to be a responsible steward of increasingly advanced AI. By the time we're at a point where 90% of people can be effectively automated out of a job, we'll have had to have figured out some alternative way of distributing resources among the population, i.e. a meaningful UBI backed by continued growth of our species' collective wealth and productivity. I can easily imagine a not-too-distant world that is effectively post-scarcity, where it's not frowned upon to spend years (or lifetimes) on non-income-generating pursuits, and where the only jobs performed by humans are entrepreneur, executive, politician, judge, general, teacher, and other things of that must be done by humans for one reason or another.
So am I happy that AI is encroaching on skilled labor? In the short term, not necessarily. But it's not necessarily bad either, it's the reality that we're in, and long-term I'm more optimistic than not.
Re: Launch HN: Play.ht (YC W23) – Generate and clone voices from 20 seconds of audio
#274The world is going to become a much worse place over the next few years. I want to be an optimist, but it will take huge leaps in humanity's societal structures for AI not to be a net negative for the vast majority of people on this planet in the short term.
Yea I already started moving to the very edges of society and trying to move even further. Had pretty successful crops just need to scale it up and reduce need for outside resources more and more.
Re: Launch HN: Play.ht (YC W23) – Generate and clone voices from 20 seconds of audio
#275Listening to the demos I'm not entirely convinced by this ( https://playground.play.ht/listen/189 was pretty funny). I wonder if this company will end up taking down (and subsequently pricing out most people using this tech for fun) arbitrary voice generation just like its competitors have so far. Going to the demo page and hearing a random snippet of Musk-worship was pretty weird. Out of all audio tracks to place at…
Wow, I call to the team behind this. I really STRONGLY think you should at least implement some sort of URL stealthing. I'm not a Web Security expert, but it reminds me of a talk where some company just made medical records 'public' like this.
On the contrary, this should be accessible so we can see what people are generating.
Re: Launch HN: Play.ht (YC W23) – Generate and clone voices from 20 seconds of audio
#276Earlier quoted context omitted.
You may get your wish. The FTC posted an article about this a week ago. [1] > The FTC Act’s prohibition on deceptive or unfair conduct can apply if you make, sell, or use a tool that is effectively designed to deceive – even if that’s not its intended or sole purpose. It seems like an awfully broad rule? But they probably could go after this startup if they noticed it. There are some kinds of businesses where making…
[flagged]
Wouldn't fewer people having access make your proposed scenario less likely, regardless?
If other people continue to have access as well as the '3 letter agencies', the same power will still exists for the agencies, except that there will also be an essentially unlimited number of other people who could be used as scapegoats.
If only '3 letter agencies' have access, they would obviously be the first ones to come under scrutiny if a case of misuse were discovered.
Re: Launch HN: Play.ht (YC W23) – Generate and clone voices from 20 seconds of audio
#277Playing with this now, wow. My mom passed away a few years ago. I always let her calls go to my voicemail so I could have them. I was using Google Voice at the time so this worked wonderfully. Unfortunately, I will not listen to many of them — she was an alcoholic and I can't bear to listen to her while drunk. The few I have of her when she's sober I listen to occasionally. Having said, this is really nice.
Sorry man. :( I wish you well
Re: Launch HN: Play.ht (YC W23) – Generate and clone voices from 20 seconds of audio
#278Earlier quoted context omitted.
[flagged]
Wouldn't fewer people having access make your proposed scenario less likely, regardless? If other people continue to have access as well as the '3 letter agencies', the same power will still exists for the agencies, except that there will also be an essentially unlimited number of other people who could be used as scapegoats. If only '3 letter agencies' have access, they would obviously be the first ones to come unde…
Yes but people will continue generating meme recordings like the ones going around showing the recent POTUSs gaming dialogue. Thus showing everyone not to trust anything.
Without that, we'll just never know, and Joe Blow who never saw a deepfake of Joe Biden praising the stickiness of the latest OG Kush will trust anything.
Re: Launch HN: Play.ht (YC W23) – Generate and clone voices from 20 seconds of audio
#279Earlier quoted context omitted.
Massively reducing costs for Voice Over in Video Games. This should make it even feasible to create mods with audio which would be great :)
I think “talking” with dead relatives or friends will become real pretty soon. If people can find comfort hearing their mom say words of encouragement in a tough situation, I think a lot of people would do it. Kinda hard because for some others that would mean never getting closure. Weird stuff is certainly about to happen…
The last thing on earth I'd want is for any aspect of my dead relatives to be reanimated through technology. No. That's absolutely fucking horrific to consider. I don't need a hallucinating AI pretending to be my dead wife. That's literally shambolic.
There is vastly more potential for that to be abused by others than used in any emotionally or socially constructive way.
Re: Launch HN: Play.ht (YC W23) – Generate and clone voices from 20 seconds of audio
#280Earlier quoted context omitted.
> face to face for important communications Funny how computing perfected communication and ultimately will undermine itself. > I don't know what the way forward is for news. I'd say every packet of voice/img will have to be signed by the recording device and checked at rendering time. > I truly do not understand people like these founders Me neither. Don't do it. We don't need that, and the malevolent use of this wi…
This is democratising the tech. Otherwise only the intelligence agencies will have it and we will continue to be duped not knowing what is possible.
We don't need to all be able to use the tech for it to be known publicly.
Apply your same logic to any other easily misused tech:
"We must all have easy access to bio-engineered viruses. Otherwise only..."
"We all need to have access to nuclear weapons. Otherwise only..."
Not all tech should be in everyone's hands.