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by wenc 2208 days ago
Re: voice -- yep, you and every celebrity -- it's already possible to synthesize voices from a small sample.

https://www.descript.com/lyrebird-ai

Alexa can already talk like Samuel L Jackson.

https://www.amazon.com/Samuel-L-Jackson-celebrity-voice/dp/B...

It's a risk, but to me it's also a part of living in this century. Human voice impersonators have always existed. When Photoshop became a phenomenon, everybody knew that photographs could be manipulated. SFX departments have always been able to produce fake scenes -- and now with deep learning, more people are able to do it (albeit somewhat badly). Not advocating that anyone feeds training data to voice assistants, but in the end it's a personal decision based on what you value.

For me, it's impossible to uninvent technology, so all we can do is to manage the risks.

1 comments

So you're suggesting I embrace the tech?

I think I'll do this. I don't feel like I can reasonably protect myself from data-snooping companies, whether I use their products or not.

If it fits with your values and are ok with giving up some (but not all) privacy, sure.