[Falkvinge]

It is reasonably common in the voicing part of the acting industry, when a famous name turns you down, that you instead turn to a voice imitator to give a performance that's reminiscent of a number of factors (kind of sounding like this other person, for example).

This way, legally you're in the clear, because you didn't use the voice of X. Not on any occasion did you use the voice of X. You even paid a voicer to make your recordings, and it's their voice.

Morally, it can be - and probably is - a different matter.

[eqvinox]

> It is reasonably common in the voicing part of the acting industry, when a famous name turns you down, that you instead turn to a voice imitator

Citation needed.

Even when VAs are recast for reasons beyond control (death, unavailability, aging child voice, health, etc.), they are only similar, not imitations. Happened in a lot of anime.

[Fiahil]

Yet, legal opinions seems to differ : https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40423224

[wokwokwok]

I think, as with most things, it’s slightly more legally ambiguous if the person you’re copying/whatever is rich enough to have good lawyers and a strong media presence.

You can argue about these morality of that, but I think it’s reasonably true, practically.

Thus, it got taken down.

[gizajob]

Especially given the very clear cut case here of the AI company deliberately cloning the voice of the most recognisable and human-like AI voice from fiction. And also tweeting that they’d done exactly that. And then lying that it was a coincidence. It wouldn’t stand up in court which is why they got rid of it – I’m sure that if Sam Altman and his counsel believed that they could beat ScarJo in court then we’d still be listening to “Sky”.

[throwawaymaths]

> the most recognisable and human-like AI voice from fiction

No, that would be either cortana or Majel Barrett Roddenberry.

[bloopernova]

Not HAL?

[eqvinox]

I think the problem with HAL is that some people would recognize the attitude, not the voice ;D

(i.e. I'm not sure if I would jump to "that's HAL!" if it weren't in disobeyance and vaguely threatening…)

[gizajob]

I’m sure “Majel” is in the pipeline.

Would the everywoman on the street be able to recognise Majel over Scarlett? I don’t believe so.

[throwawaymaths]

I don't think most people recognized Scarlett either, and if so, they recognized her not from "Her" but generally as an actor

[kolinko]

They didn’t clone her voice

[twobitshifter]

Why do people think they need an actor? You can recreate a voice from just a few seconds of audio today. Do that and then mix in some fair use modifiers to CYA.