Actor Scarlett Johansson has accused OpenAI of copying her voice for some of the voice assisstants in ChatGPT regardless of denying the corporate permission to take action. Johansson’s remark on Monday got here hours after OpenAI stated that the corporate would no longer use the voice in ChatGPT however didn’t supply a reason.
“Last September, I received an offer from Sam Altman, who wanted to hire me to voice the current ChatGPT 4.0 system,” Johansson wrote within the remark shared through her public members of the family group with Engadget (NPR first reported the tale). “He told me that he felt that by my voicing the system, I could bridge the gap between tech companies and creatives and help consumers to feel comfortable with the seismic shift concerning humans and AI. He said he felt that my voice would be comforting to people.” Johansson added that she declined the be offering after “much consideration and for personal reasons,” but if OpenAI demoed GPT-4o, the corporate’s newest huge language fashion final week, “my friends, family, and the general public all noted how much the newest system named ’Sky’ sounded like me.”
When Johansson noticed OpenAI’s newest demo, she stated she was once “shocked, angered and in disbelief that Mr. Altman would pursue a voice that sounded so eerily similar to mind that my closest friends and news outlets could not tell the difference.” She additionally published that Altman had contacted her agent simply two days prior to the corporate published GPT-4o and requested her to rethink, however launched the gadget anyway prior to she had a possibility to reply.
“The voice of Sky isn’t Scarlett Johansson’s, and it was once by no means meant to resemble hers,” an OpenAI spokesperson stated in a remark despatched to Engadget that the corporate attributed to Altman, OpenAI’s co-founder and CEO. “We forged the voice actor in the back of Sky’s voice prior to any outreach to Ms. Johansson. Out of appreciate for Ms. Johansson, now we have paused the usage of Sky’s voice in our merchandise. We’re sorry to Ms. Johansson that we didn’t be in contact higher.”
Despite the fact that “Sky” has been some of the voice assisstants in ChatGPT since September 2023, GPT-4o, which the corporate introduced final week, takes issues a step additional. The corporate stated that the brand new fashion is nearer to “much more natural human-computer interaction” and demoed its executives having just about human-like conversations with the voice assistant in ChatGPT. This invited comparisons to Samantha, the digital voice assistant performed through Johansson within the 2013 film Her who has an intimate dating with a human being. In a while after the development, Altman tweeted a unmarried phrase — “her” — in an obvious connection with the movie.
On Monday, OpenAI said that it was once pausing the usage of “Sky” in ChatGPT and launched a lengthy post revealing how the corporate employed skilled voice actors to create its personal digital assistants, and denying any similarities with Johansson’s voice.
“We imagine that AI voices must no longer intentionally mimic a celeb’s unique voice — Sky’s voice isn’t an imitation of Scarlett Johansson however belongs to another skilled actress the usage of her personal herbal talking voice,” OpenAI wrote and added that each and every of its performers, who it declined to call for privateness causes, was once paid “above top-of-market rates, and this will continue for as long as their voices are used in our products.”
This transfer, Johansson stated in her remark, simplest got here after she employed criminal suggest who wrote two letters to Altman and OpenAI requesting a proof. “In a time when we are all grappling with deepfakes and the protection of our own likeness, our own work, our own identities, I believe these are questions that deserve absolute clarity,” Johansson wrote. “I look forward to resolution in the form of transparency and the passage of appropriate legislation to help ensure that individual rights are protected.”
Replace, Might 20 2024, 9:09 PM ET: This tale has been up to date to incorporate a remark from OpenAI.
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