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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

#51

Post by gamblor956 »

joekinley wrote: post #29

I can't help but think that this was all planned. It is a very intricately planned, and geniously executed marketing ploy to make sure everyone knows about the company, the new release, that there is voice now, and even makes everyone look into it just to "see for themselves". Whether this was in with ScarJo in the loop or not, does not really change the outcome, but would be a nice information we probably will never…

It's not very impressive.

As a result of the negative publicity, most people know OpenAI as the company that steals things from other people. Most of them will never hear that this one time, OpenAI didn't actually do the thing they were accused of doing.

That's the problem with having a repeat liar as a CEO: you lose any credibility for those rare instances when you're actually telling the truth.

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

#52

Post by tivert »

MattGaiser wrote: post #47
tivert wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Yes, but it changes the narrative from “they couldn’t get Scarlett to record the voice, so they copied her voice” to something much less malicious. I don't think it's less malicious if they decided to copy her voice without her consent, but just didn't tell her until the project was underway, then continued even after she said no. There's legal precedent that hiring a copycat is not OK, so it's not like proving it…

They used a different person, so it is not her voice.

> They used a different person, so it is not her voice.

That doesn't matter because it's an impersonation. Ford lost, even though they didn't use Bette Midler's voice either: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midler_v._Ford_Motor_Co.

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

#53

Post by xbmcuser »

I am assuming they deliberately wanted the voice to sound like Her (the movie) for marketing so copied the voice then tried to get Johansson's permission once the legal department raised some objections. They went through with it anyway when they did not get permission. Altman has shown time again he will ignore all the rules and laws if they hamper his goals. This what I think happened I am not saying it did and I could be wrong

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

#54

Post by huygens6363 »

Ariel_Asura wrote: post #5

It seems increasingly difficult for common people to protect their voices, especially when even Scarlett Johansson can't manage it. As a part-time voice actor with a unique voice, I'm concerned about what I should do if my voice is used without permission and the company denies it. How can I protect myself in such a situation?

1) Your income depends on a physical quality you have.

2) Your ability to mine cash off this physical quality depends on the inability of this quality to be reproduced.

3) This quality can now be reproduced.

I would think very hard and very long about staying in this particular business. Personally I think there is still plenty of work left because not everyone is happy with going full sci-fi dystopia, but it will be niche and scrappy.

"I have unique characteristics that make me an excellent programmer. I earn money by tweaking for-loops. Recently, GPT is being able to tweak for-loops better, faster and more cheaply than I can. How can I protect myself in case companies decide to replicate my unique abilities?"

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

#55

Post by JumpCrisscross »

yorwba wrote: post #38
pavlov wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Surely there’s some kind of difference between “voice impression for a two-line cameo in one episode of an animated sitcom” and “reproducing your voice as the primary interface for a machine that could be used by billions of people and is worth hundreds of billions of dollars.” Is there a name for this AI fallacy? The one where programmers make an inductive leap like, for example, if a human can read one book to lear…

If famous actors could sue over the use of a less-famous actor that sounds just like them, what's to stop less-famous actors from suing over the use of a famous actor who sounds just like them in big-budget movies? ... and that's when you discover that "unique voice" is a one-in-a-million thing and thousands of people have the same voice, all asking for their payout.

> what's to stop less-famous actors from suing over the use of a famous actor who sounds just like them in big-budget movies?

Not having idiots (or ChatGPT) for judges.

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

#56

Post by somenameforme »

jrockway wrote: post #10

I was perusing some Simpsons clips this afternoon and came across a story to the effect of "So and so didn't want to play himself, so Dan Castellaneta did the voice." It's a good impression and people didn't seem very upset about that. I am not sure how this is different. (Apparently this particular "impression" predates the Her character, so it's even easier to not be mad about. It's just a coincidence. They weren't…

That example isn't really pertinent, because in the case of the Simpsons it's fairly certain that the actors and actresses sign away the rights to their likeness to the company, otherwise there'd be major issues if one ever quit, became unable to work, just wanted a bunch of money, or whatever. There's probably some poor analogy with how if you write software, your company [generally] owns it.

For something more general look at Midler vs Ford [1], and lots of other similar cases. Ford wanted to use get Midler to sing some of her songs (that Ford owned the copyright to) for a commercial. She refused, so they hired an impersonator. They never stated it was Midler in the commercial, but nonetheless were sued and lost for abuse of 'rights of personality' even for content they owned the copyright to! Uncopyrightable characteristics highly associated with a person are still legally protected. Similar stuff with fight refs. Various trademark lines like 'Let's get it on!' or 'Let's get readddy to rumble.' are literally trademarked, but it's probably not even strictly necessary since it would be implicitly protected by rights of personality.

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

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

#57

Post by xyst »

I don’t think OpenAI has a chance to win this in open court.

They are very likely to settle out of court. Investors get a bit anxious with pending litigation.

But I honestly hope Johansson does not. She certainly has the runway to take it all the way. Make them look like fools in open court. Show the people their real colors.

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

#58

Post by tivert »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #55
yorwba wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If famous actors could sue over the use of a less-famous actor that sounds just like them, what's to stop less-famous actors from suing over the use of a famous actor who sounds just like them in big-budget movies? ... and that's when you discover that "unique voice" is a one-in-a-million thing and thousands of people have the same voice, all asking for their payout.

> what's to stop less-famous actors from suing over the use of a famous actor who sounds just like them in big-budget movies? Not having idiots (or ChatGPT) for judges.

> Not having idiots (or ChatGPT) for judges.

Always the Achilles heel of software engineers' (not so) clever legal strategies.

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

#59

Post by gnicholas »

tivert wrote: post #52
MattGaiser wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They used a different person, so it is not her voice.

> They used a different person, so it is not her voice. That doesn't matter because it's an impersonation. Ford lost, even though they didn't use Bette Midler's voice either: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midler_v._Ford_Motor_Co .

It seems like the key difference is that the advertisements in those cases involved people who sounded like particular musical artists, singing songs that those artists were well-known for singing. If you hired the woman who voiced Sky to say lines that Scarlett had in some of her movies, that would be similar. The fact that this is a chatbot makes it somewhat of an echo of those cases, but it strikes me (a former lawyer) as being a bridge too far. After all, you have to balance Scarlett's rights against the rights of someone who happens to have a voice that sounds like Scarlett's (it would be different if this were someone doing an impersonation of Scarlett, but whose natural voice sounds different).

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

#60

Post by frankacter »

tivert wrote: post #52
MattGaiser wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They used a different person, so it is not her voice.

> They used a different person, so it is not her voice. That doesn't matter because it's an impersonation. Ford lost, even though they didn't use Bette Midler's voice either: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midler_v._Ford_Motor_Co .

It's not an impersonation it is the actor using their own natural voice.

"We believe that AI voices should not deliberately mimic a celebrity's distinctive voice — Sky's voice is not an imitation of Scarlett Johansson but belongs to a different professional actress using *her own natural speaking voice*"

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