Amazon’s Alexa could soon replicate the voice of family members, even if they are dead.
The capability, presented at Amazon’s Re: Mars conference in Las Vegas, is under development and would allow the virtual assistant to mimic the voice of a specific person based on a less than one-minute recording.
Rohit Prasad, Alexa’s senior vice president and chief scientist, said Wednesday at the event that the function’s desire was to build more confidence in users’ interactions with Alexa by putting more “human attributes of empathy and affection.” .
“These attributes have become even more important during the ongoing pandemic, when many of us have lost those we love,” Prasad said. “While AI can’t eliminate the pain of loss, it can definitely make your memories last.”
In a video played by Amazon at the event, a small child asks “Alexa, can Grandma finish reading me the Wizard of Oz?” Alexa then acknowledges the request and switches to another voice that mimics the child’s grandmother. Then the voice assistant continues reading the book with that same voice.
To create the feature, Prasad said the company had to learn how to make a “high-quality voice” with a shorter recording, as opposed to recording hours in a studio. Amazon did not provide further details about the feature, which is bound to raise more privacy concerns and ethical questions about consent.
Amazon’s push comes when competitor Microsoft earlier this week said it was reducing its synthetic voice offerings and setting stricter guidelines to “ensure the active participation of the speaker” whose voice is recreated. Microsoft said Tuesday that it will limit which customers can use the service, while still highlighting acceptable uses, such as an interactive Bugs Bunny character in AT&T stores.
“This technology has exciting potential in education, accessibility and entertainment, but it’s also easy to imagine how it could be used to improperly impersonate speakers and deceive listeners,” said Natasha Crampton, who heads the ethics division of Microsoft AI, in a blog post. .
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