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Lyrebird Claims It Can Recreate Anyone's Voice Based On Just a 1 Minute Sample (theverge.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the he-said-she-said dept.

Artem Tashkinov writes: Today, a Canadian artificial intelligence startup named Lyrebird unveiled its voice imitation deep learning algorithm that can mimic a person's voice and have it read any text with a given emotion, based on the analysis of just a few dozen seconds of audio recording. The website features samples using the recreated voices of Donald Trump, Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton. A similar technology was created by Adobe around a year ago but it requires over 20 minutes of recorded speech. The company sets to open its APIs to the public, while the computing for the task will be performed in the cloud.

23 of 121 comments (clear)

  1. AI killing industry by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Goodbye, voice actors.
    Film actors, you're next.

    1. Re:AI killing industry by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Informative

      Not yet, at least. They current sound like Robama and the Trumpinator.

      Word verification: rejector

    2. Re:AI killing industry by MightyYar · · Score: 3, Interesting

      I don't think so. Stars still have legal rights over their likeness. I think you'd have a lot of trouble getting away with saying something like "Starring... a voice like Paul Rudd's, a voice like Carrie Fisher's, etc...".

      Star power isn't going anywhere. There's really no logical reason that famous film stars are also billed prominently for animation, and yet that's what we have.

      --
      W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
    3. Re:AI killing industry by gweilo8888 · · Score: 2

      Yep, and even if they didn't sound hopelessly artificial and robotic, they don't really sound *that* close to the people they're supposed to be anyway. Somewhat close, but hardly professional impersonator close.

    4. Re:AI killing industry by grumling · · Score: 3, Insightful

      People don't realize the amount of effort people are willing to put into CGI. Same thing will happen with voices. Photorealistic actors are already here, we see them all the time but don't realize it. Just about every action movie made in the 2000's has heavy doses of CGI, often times in surprising scenes where one wouldn't expect to see it.

      Hollywood bean counters will love it because it means higher profits. Cable networks will love it because they can crank out cheap product. Producers and directors will love it because they can program actors like the program CGI. Actors will love it because they can get back on the stage and forget about that movie stuff. Viewers will love it because we really just want to look at pretty pictures and are happy to suspend our beliefs if the face is pretty enough.

      --
      "Well, good luck finding a judge that doesn't run a bestiality site."
    5. Re:AI killing industry by locater16 · · Score: 2

      You just create "artificial" stars. Hatsune Miku already works in Japan, it'll work in the rest of the world too.

    6. Re:AI killing industry by JustAnotherOldGuy · · Score: 2

      Not yet, at least. They current sound like Robama and the Trumpinator.

      Give it ten minutes of speech and I'll bet it's a hell of a lot better (more like the real voice).

      This will only get better and better, and I'd hazard a guess that before long most of us won't be able to tell the real voice from the synthetic one.

      --
      Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...
  2. How long before estates of dead entertainers sue ? by UnknownSoldier · · Score: 4, Interesting

    If this true I imagine Hollywood would jump on this -- they now have one less reason to be inconvenienced when an (popular) actor dies.

    Someone uses a reconstruction of someone else's popular, but now dead voice, as a marketing ploy -- much like Natalie Cole hijacked her father's song -- are we going to have lawsuits over unauthorized sound-a-likes now?

    I also imagine the music industry would go crazy over it as well. First with their Auto-Tune shenanigans I'm now waiting for the inevitable "Auto-Sing" -- "we can recreate the voice of any dead singer!"

  3. Um... needs work. A lot of work by saikou · · Score: 2

    So far the every sample (including titular one with Robo Donald Trump) sounds like a mangled Stephen Hawking voice-bot :(
    If I heard that voice from behind the door asking if I were John Connor, I'd say I'm a meat popsicle.

    --
    Hyperom.com
  4. Imagine when the dishonest and corrupt CIA by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    gets their hands on this. With photorealistic CGI and manufactured voices, they can manufacture any recorded situation and evidence they want, and pass it off as real.

    I think we will eventually reach a point in the world where every person of notability has a private encryption key, and any statement or appearance they make will be signed so people know what is real and what is not.

    1. Re:Imagine when the dishonest and corrupt CIA by sexconker · · Score: 2

      Either:

      The encryption scheme you're using is flawed by design due to their moles influencing in their design, allowing them to break it rapidly, or they know of practical flaws that they did not put in there but that they have also chosen to hide from the public.

      They surreptitiously steal your private key.

      They have quantum computing capabilities advanced enough to run practical attacks on the encryption scheme you're using.

      Very few encryption schemes are mathematically proven to be secure, and they typically just devolve into the problem of keeping a secret (e.g., one time pads).

    2. Re:Imagine when the dishonest and corrupt CIA by pushing-robot · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I suspect more the reverse; it will be a convenient way to deny anything inconvenient.

      1. Leader: 'X'
      2. Leader: 'I never said X'
      3. Opposition: 'But hundreds of people heard you say X'
      4. Leader: 'Either they are my enemies, in which case they are liars, or they are my supporters, and know in their heart I didn't say X'
      5. Opposition: 'We even have a video of you saying X'
      6. Leader: 'And you just made that up, with your computers and things! Enemies! Off with your heads!'

      There seems to be a global current these days, away from the principles of Enlightenment and Absolutism, back toward Authoritarianism and the denial of objectivity. When facts become subjective, all viewpoints are equally valid and 'truth' can be determined by vote or decree. Quite Nineteen Eighty-Four (although it predated Orwell by thousands of years).

      --
      How can I believe you when you tell me what I don't want to hear?
  5. Re:How long before estates of dead entertainers su by The+Raven · · Score: 5, Insightful

    This is true in the same way that auto-tune removes the need for musical singing ability. Sure, you can force a certain note, but it sounds artificial. Similarly this tool can replicate a voice at standard timbres and emotions well enough to be recognizable, but not well enough to be undetectable as a digital emulation.

    It's not until it's undetectable (such as some of the best modern CGI) that we'll actually have made actors obsolete. Except... amazingly, CGI costs more than the actors, it's less flexible, and slower. I think it will be quite a while before we have something that is both on-par for quality and cheaper than a skilled live human.

    --
    "I will trust Google to 'do no evil' until the founders no longer run it." Hello Alphabet.
  6. Frankly I find this scary by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    I wouldn't class myself as a technophobe but this leaves us all open to the creation of a "confession" for something we have not done. Scary shit in my opinion. And no I don't trust some law inforcement agencies or in fact some government agencies to do just that. (I'll put on my tinfoil hat)

  7. Re:How long before estates of dead entertainers su by phantomfive · · Score: 2

    It's already happened. Here's another one.

    --
    "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
  8. I love their approach by davecb · · Score: 2

    The folks at University of Montréal aren't to be sneezed at. https://lyrebird.ai/ethics makes a nice bilingual joke.

    --
    davecb@spamcop.net
  9. Can it do ... by PPH · · Score: 3, Interesting

    ... Fran Drescher?

    --
    Have gnu, will travel.
  10. Are you guys actually listening to these samples? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

    While this technology does a decent job capturing some of the voice characteristics, it still sounds like a damn generated voice. Im no sound expert but its the reverb or something like that in the generated voice that makes it sound just like all other generated voice. Hell if you didn't tell me that was Obama I might not even have put 2 and 2 together - sounds like a drunk (lacking enunciation) Obama I suppose. The Hillary, barely even recognizable as her. Sorry but I cant hear past the "robot" voice attenuation, which is what plagues all generated voice.

  11. Re:Are you guys actually listening to these sample by Radical+Moderate · · Score: 2

    Yeah, it's impressive for what it is, but they don't sound human. The Trump voice was the closest, but then Trump doesn't sound like any other human I've ever heard.

    --
    Never let a lack of data get in the way of a good rant.
  12. Voice Analyzer? by Z80a · · Score: 4, Funny

    Hello, i am the system administrator. My voice is my password, verify me.

  13. Re:Are you guys actually listening to these sample by platinummyr · · Score: 3, Insightful

    The point of this isn't that they can recreate 100% believable audio yet, but that they can get really close, and that it's going to happen relatively soon, so we should stop relying on audio recording as authentic.

  14. scammers rejoice by liquid_schwartz · · Score: 3, Informative
    Now you don't even have to trick your victim into saying yes, you can just keep them talking for a minute. If you're unfamiliar with the scam, here's a description:

    http://fortune.com/2017/03/28/...

  15. AI and cloud computing is a very dangerous combo by TheOuterLinux · · Score: 2

    The true goal of AI is to destroy encryption while digitally fingerprinting all of us for those that use SSL and VPN, or whatever comes next. If an AI can recreate your voice, than it can definitely know who is typing what on the Internet. Uploading biometric data to social networks isn't helping much either. Cloud computing was designed from open source software at the start to make better use of mobile devices. But now, it is currently utilized by corporations to destroy the freedoms of the desktop, the privacy of software users, and removing control. This does not set well with most Linux people and the irony is that most cloud servers are running Linux. This allows companies to "love" open source and actually mean it, but it's really a kick in the nuts for anyone that loves FOSS and a huge financial advantage for not paying for licenses, ergo using server-based open source to destroy its desktop competition. I can get access to your API? O'lordy sir. Thankya fors ya scraps. Fuck API's. Cloud computing is just an excuse to get people who will buy mobile devices but not new laptops stuck into something they have to pay for and no control over. They could try to standardize a new architecture like they did in the late 2000s to get people to buy tech, but the cloud way is cheaper and they make more money and save more by not having the demand to improve hardware. I saw a new laptop the other day for $400 and it only sports 1.2Gz and 4GB of RAM. WTF is this shit? Y'all need to wake up because the millennial "It's 1984, oh well" syndrome is going to put us into something we average consumers can't get out of.