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

washingtonpost.com

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

#811

Post by SilverBirch »

xpe wrote: post #390
SilverBirch wrote: post #374

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think you understand. It's extremely well established in law, you can't approach someone to voice an advert for you, get told no, and then hire an impersonator to do it. Take all the AI hype bullshit and the cult of personality bullshit out of it. What Altman did is very standard and very clearly not allowed. He will end up paying for this in monetary terms, and paying further for it in the reputation damage…

> It's extremely well established in law, you can't approach someone to voice an advert for you, get told no, and then hire an impersonator to do it. Can you explain and/or cite the legal basis here? What cases? What law?

It's termed personality rights[1] and this would be appropriation of her likeness. There's good reason that famous actors actually get commercial work and we don't just hire soundalikes all the time.

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

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

#812

Post by mwigdahl »

SilverBirch wrote: post #374
throwaway115 wrote: post #133

This whole thing is starting to feel like another Sam Altman spotlight production. There's enough evidence to show no wrongdoing, but it was handled in a way to make people think there was a scandal. Maximum spotlight for relatively low risk. I wonder if people will get tired of being jerked around like this.

I don't think you understand. It's extremely well established in law, you can't approach someone to voice an advert for you, get told no, and then hire an impersonator to do it. Take all the AI hype bullshit and the cult of personality bullshit out of it. What Altman did is very standard and very clearly not allowed. He will end up paying for this in monetary terms, and paying further for it in the reputation damage…

This assumes that the voice actress was an impersonator. By her own statements, no one who knows her has said that her voice sounds like Scarlett Johansson (personally, I agree). And she was auditioned and hired before SJ was even approached. I don't think that this falls under the "very standard" scenario you reference.

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

#813

Post by gs17 »

m_ke wrote: post #654
lairv wrote: post #634

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Genuine question, what's wrong with trying to replicate in real life an idea from a SciFi movie ? I understand that it could be problematic if OpenAI did one of two things: - imitated Scarlett Johansson's voice to impersonate her - misled people into believing that GPT-4o is an official by-product of the film Her, like calling it “the official Her AI” The first point is still unclear, and that's precisely the point o…

Imagine if Facebook came to you and wanted an exclusive license to white label whatever you work on, then after you rejected them they went and copied most of your code but changed the hue or saturation of some of the colors and shipped it to all of their customers (There's definitely hours of Scarlet Johanssons talking in the dataset that GPT4o was trained on). Would that be ethical? EDIT: or even better, imagine ho…

> then after you rejected them

The article shows the timeline would make this them already licensing a similar product to your more famous one, then you saying no, and them continuing to use the existing similar one.

> But while many hear an eerie resemblance between “Sky” and Johansson’s “Her” character, an actress was hired to create the Sky voice months before Altman contacted Johansson, according to documents, recordings, casting directors and the actress’s agent.

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

#814

Post by mwigdahl »

volleygman180 wrote: post #433
chipweinberger wrote: post #121

People see what they want to see. If it wasn't for us being biased by the surrounding circumstances I don't think people would have confused their voices. Their voices are not that similar. I probably personally know people with a voice as similar to SJ as Sky's. You probably do too. The voice actress says the same: "I’ve never been compared to her by the people who do know me closely." But then suddenly a story emer…

I thought it sounded like SJ when I watched the demo live https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40345775&p=6#40346221

Another data point: I didn't.

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

#815

Post by sanderjd »

coffeebeqn wrote: post #636
CosmicShadow wrote: post #628

Kind of concerning to see so much sketchbag behaviour from possibly the top AI company so consistently. Sure brings a lot of confidence in the future and sad that they can get away with it and still succeed because of the tech and their big names. It feels like it took years before people started hating Google and Tesla, but these guys wasted very little time pretending to be good. Do I still pay for and use them? Un…

Kind of makes the sama ouster seem more reasonable if this is the quality of his calls

I was so confused how so many people at the time didn't think it was clearly reasonable. The man has already taken over an "open" AI company and subverted its non-profit mission and governing structure. I was sympathetic to the employees who didn't want to see their giant equity compensation evaporate, but how anyone else looked at that power struggle and thought he was on the right side of it remains beyond me.

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

#816

Post by jackothy »

Beldin wrote: post #797
jackothy wrote: post #695

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He's not necessarily saying that was the goal from the start. All he is admitting with that tweet is that it is indeed (he finds it to be) reminiscent of "Her".

And if you commision an artist to draw a black-leather tight-fit clad red-head superspy in an ad for tour product, it need not look like Black Widow from the MCU. But if it does look very much like her, it doesn't really matter whether you never intended to.

You can see plenty of discussion elsewhere in this thread regarding how similar the result actually ended up being.

All I'm saying in the comment you are replying to is that it's incorrect to claim that Altman's saying that "the goal was specifically to copy 'Her'".

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

#817

Post by gs17 »

pc86 wrote: post #553
dbreunig wrote: post #505

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This shows how bad it is. If you're proactively sharing a package of docs with the Washingington Post, you're toast. Altman's outreach, his tweet, and the thousands of tweets and comments talking about how similar Sky is to ScarJo is enough to win the case in California.

Then we can add this to the long list of insane lawsuits going the wrong way in California. They asked SJ, she said no. So they went to a voice actor and used her. Case closed, they didn't use SJ's voice without her permission. That doesn't violate any law to any reasonable person.

> That doesn't violate any law to any reasonable person.

Midler v Ford is already precedent that using a different actor isn't inherently safe legally.

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

#818

Post by foobarqux »

tptacek wrote: post #670
HarHarVeryFunny wrote: post #668

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Clearly an SJ voice was the goal, given that Altman asked her to do it, asked her a second time just two days before the ChatGPT-4o release, and then tweeted "her" on the release day. The next day Karpathy, recently ex-OpenAI, then tweets "The killer app of LLMs is Scarlett Johansson". Altman appears to be an habitual liar. Note his recent claim not to be aware of the non-disparagement and claw-back terms he had depa…

They hired the actor that did the voice months before they contacted SJ . The reaction on this site to the news that this story was false is kind of mindbending.

I don't understand the point you are trying to make. The essential question is whether they were trying to imitate (using a voice actor or otherwise) Scarlett Johansson's voice without her permission. Nothing in the article refutes that they were; whether they sought the permission before or after they started doing the imitation is irrelevant. Others have pointed to previous case law that shows that this form of imitation is illegal.

Moreover I can't see any reasonable person concluding that they were not trying to imitate her voice given that:

1. It sounds similar to her (It's unbelievable that anyone would argue that they aren't similar, moreso given #2).

2. Her voice is famous for the context in which synthetic voice is used

3. They contacted her at some point to get her permission to use her voice

4. The CEO referenced the movie which Johansson's voice is famous for (and again depicts the same context the synthetic voice is being used) shortly before they released the synthetic voice.

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

#819

Post by sanderjd »

DeathArrow wrote: post #94

In today's climate you are considered guilty until you prove you are innocent. People who accused you don't have to show any proof.

There is nothing new about people forming their own opinions without following the rules of courts of law. Indeed, it wouldn't have been so important to enshrine the "innocent until proven guilty" principle into legal systems, if it were already the normal way for people to react to things.

It's ok for people to just be people. Courts should be held to a higher standard, but that doesn't mean regular people should be expected to act like courts.

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

#820

Post by gs17 »

sib wrote: post #618
monocasa wrote: post #588

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Likeness rights are a real thing, and it's not out there to have infringed on them by going to a famous person to use their likeness, getting denied, then using another actor telling them to copy the first actor's likeness. This is why all Hollywood contracts have actors signing over their likeness in perpetuity now; which was one of the major sticking points of the recent strikes.

>> "then using another actor telling them to copy the first actor's likeness " Assumes facts not in evidence

It even assumes the opposite, since they asked SJ after recording the original voice.
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