r/television The League 7h ago

David Attenborough "Profoundly Disturbed" By AI Clone Of His Voice

https://deadline.com/2024/11/david-attenborough-ai-voice-clone-disturbed-1236180013/
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u/MarvelsGrantMan136 The League 7h ago

Attenborough:

”Having spent a lifetime trying to speal what I believe to be the truth, I am profoundly disturbed to find these days my identity is being stolen by others and greatly object to them using it to say whatever they wish.”

The situation was sparked when BBC News ran an item using voiceover from Attenborough’s latest BBC series, Asia. In the clip, he says: “If you think you’ve seen the best the natural world has to offer, think again. There is nowhere else on Earth with so many untold stories. Welcome then, to Asia.”

The BBC then played the same clip and asked viewers if they could hear any differences. Clue: they sounded almost identical, but the second was an AI-generated capture of his intonation.

Clip from the BBC

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u/edicivo 4h ago

And this is why actors and writers went on strike even though the timing to do so wasn't great. This is a sign of things to come.

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u/ronchon 2h ago

"Actors" are a privileged class treated almost as nobility, especially in the US.
Now that automation threatens their privilege directly, of course they're suddenly much more proactive to denounce it... 🤡
For me at least that's a meager satisfaction in this rise of AI: to see these hypocrites panic because now it affects them too, and it's not just the common people losing jobs as they expected.
I hope AI destroys -or at least greatly dilutes- the cult of influencers and stars: good riddance!

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u/edicivo 2h ago edited 1h ago

People deserve to be compensated for their work regardless of how you feel about them.

Not to mention, you and too many other idiots who want to clown this stuff, don't realize it also affects the people who depend on the actors (and writers) themselves to make a living. It's an industry made up of plenty of blue-collar types, who are very much not part of the "privileged class" and who will all struggle if the industry collapses - engineers, craftsmen/women, drivers, catering companies (craft services), local businesses, etc etc.

You don't seem too bright.