I don't get why this is controversial. Documentaries constantly have someone reading a written document while imitating the voice of the author, and none of them come out and say "This is not the actual voice of Abraham Lincoln". Why is having a computer imitate someone's voice different from having a person do it?
Voice clone of Anthony Bourdain prompts synthetic media ethics questions
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Re: Voice clone of Anthony Bourdain prompts synthetic media ethics questions
#52Out of all the celebrities, Bourdain would have viscerally despised this. He hated fake phoney people, or food. He hated when his production crew would stovepipe his bits. He hated a scene in Greese (I believe) where crew went out and bought squid, and threw them into the water to made the shoot better. I really liked Bourdain. He was one of the few celebrities that didn't seem to change with fame, or money. I watche…
Just quick context on the squid bit: it wasn’t Tony’s crew (zero point zero productions), it was the combination of local fixers/boat folks who wanted to make it look like they caught fish.
I enjoyed the running gag (based on many episodes) of Bourdain going on a local fishing/hunting trip and failing to catch anything, and then having to scramble to some other local place and make up for the lack of a catch which some times were some of the highlights of the episode. And then on rare occasions when they did catch their prey, it made for a nice juxtaposition.
Re: Voice clone of Anthony Bourdain prompts synthetic media ethics questions
#53Earlier quoted context omitted.
We don't get immunity to photoshop in the "I can tell from some of the pixels" sense, but we gain immunity in the sense that we no longer accept every image as representing absolute truth. Plenty of people today still think that video manipulation more sophisticated than an instagram filter takes a Hollywood budget or a lot of expertise. Once people get more experience seeing and creating deepfakes on their own they'…
we gain immunity in the sense that we no longer accept every image as representing absolute truth GPs whole point about body image is that, as a society, we don't have that immunity. Basically no one has a healthy ideal of what a good body image is because we never even get to see them.
The fact that media can so effectively influence our view of an ideal body has little to do with our awareness about photo manipulation. We know full well photos are touched up and fake. In fact we're at the point now where millions of people are so aware of it that they are routinely editing their own photos to match whatever the ideal being pushed at us in the moment is. Maybe that's "instagram face" or giant asses, hell I remember when it was heroin chic. The point is that we all know it's fake. It just doesn't matter because media tells us what to like/want regardless.
Re: Voice clone of Anthony Bourdain prompts synthetic media ethics questions
#54I think with correct context and or the correct say so this would be fine. But:
I didn't really follow Mr.Bourdain at all, but given the clarity from other people who did, and believe he would have hated this; then it's not the act of making a voice clone that's unethical it's doing it outside of the wishes, or what would be the perceived wishes of that person.
In other words this is unethical because had they gone to ask permission from the estate/whoever could make that call now that Mr.Bourdain is no longer with us they would have likely gotten a no.
It makes it particularly egregious that if these people were so interested in making this clone of his voice that they likely would have followed him closely enough to know he wouldn't have agreed to this if he were alive.
I guess you can boil my position down to without permission, explicit or implied, it's unethical and not only that, legally I'd put it under impersonation.
Re: Voice clone of Anthony Bourdain prompts synthetic media ethics questions
#55As a viewer of the documentary, I will love that effect instead of a bland voice-over. But a note should be added on the screen that the voice is AI-generated. Like when they say a war video is a reenactment.
Why would it have to be a bland voice-over? It's an email he sent to a friend. Have the friend read it. I imagine the friend would become emotional. That's far more riveting than a computer recreation, no?
Re: Voice clone of Anthony Bourdain prompts synthetic media ethics questions
#56As a viewer of the documentary, I will love that effect instead of a bland voice-over. But a note should be added on the screen that the voice is AI-generated. Like when they say a war video is a reenactment.
It would be interesting to see if recreating songs is possible, if so i would like to hear the voice of Jim morrison and Curt Cobain.
You should watch The Doors movie by Oliver Stone starring Val Kilmer. Much of the music, including vocals, was redone with Val singing. It can be quite unsettling at times
Re: Voice clone of Anthony Bourdain prompts synthetic media ethics questions
#57If they had used a voice actor to recite the Bourdain letter --- would that be the same sacrilege as using an AI?
Re: Voice clone of Anthony Bourdain prompts synthetic media ethics questions
#58My brother and I had a running joke that Tom Araya from Slayer died in the mid 90s, based on his ashen appearance in the Divine Intervention sleeve. Our “theory” was all of his vocals after then were bits of previous recordings reassembled into new songs. It sounded technically possible with manual editing back then, but it has already gone so far as to automatable.
In this case, for a documentary, I see how that’s a defensible used case. They could hire an actor to read the email, imitating Bourdain’s voice as closely as possible, to the same effect. Other uses certainly could be problematic. Discussing them and working out legal and cultural rules is very relevant right now. We’ve already had posthumous celebrity event appearances over the past couple of years. Famous actors could be in movies with needing to be involved very much - mainly an IP license. I have no doubt record companies would love to create new music with all the artists of the 60s-80s, dead or alive.
Re: Voice clone of Anthony Bourdain prompts synthetic media ethics questions
#59Out of all the celebrities, Bourdain would have viscerally despised this. He hated fake phoney people, or food. He hated when his production crew would stovepipe his bits. He hated a scene in Greese (I believe) where crew went out and bought squid, and threw them into the water to made the shoot better. I really liked Bourdain. He was one of the few celebrities that didn't seem to change with fame, or money. I watche…
The bone luge thing was completely made up. The restaurant didn’t do bone luges. It’s mentioned explicitly in World Travel.
I have no problem with a fake voice reading Bourdain’s own words.
Re: Voice clone of Anthony Bourdain prompts synthetic media ethics questions
#60If they had used a voice actor to recite the Bourdain letter --- would that be the same sacrilege as using an AI?
Sacrilegious bit is that it's not disclosed. It's made to be deceptive.