By Daybreak Chmielewski and Anna Tong
Scarlett Johansson on Monday accused OpenAI of making a voice for the ChatGPT system that sounded “eerily similar” to the actress after she declined to voice the chatbot herself.
Johansson made the feedback in an announcement launched hours after the unreal intelligence firm stated it was taking down the voice, known as ‘Sky.’
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman stated in an announcement emailed to Reuters on Monday that Sky’s voice was not an imitation of Johansson, however belonged to a unique skilled actress.
“The voice of Sky is not Scarlett Johansson’s, and it was never intended to resemble hers. We cast the voice actor behind Sky’s voice before any outreach to Ms. Johansson,” Altman stated.
“Out of respect for Ms. Johansson, we have paused using Sky’s voice in our products. We are sorry to Ms. Johansson that we didn’t communicate better.”
The combat over rights to actors’ voices and pictures has turn out to be a spotlight in Hollywood as studios contemplate methods to use AI to create new leisure and because the computer-produced photos and sounds turn out to be troublesome to tell apart from these of people.
Johansson within the assertion stated Altman had approached her final September and supplied to rent her to voice a ChatGPT voice — a suggestion she declined.
“Nine months later, my friends, family and the general public all noted how much the newest system named ‘Sky’ sounded like me,” she stated.
“When I heard the released demo, I was shocked, angered and in disbelief that Mr. Altman would pursue a voice that sounded so eerily similar to mine that my closest friends and news outlets could not tell the difference.”
Johansson added that Altman had “insinuated that the similarity was intentional” by tweeting a reference to “her,” the 2013 film a few man who develops a relationship with an AI assistant voiced by the actress.
Johansson’s notice was revealed by journalists from NPR and different information shops. Her publicist additionally shared it with Reuters.
She stated that she had employed authorized counsel to ask concerning the course of of making the voice.
OpenAI confirmed off its latest AI mannequin, known as GPT-4o, final week, with audio capabilities that permit customers converse to the chatbot and procure real-time responses, marking a big development in additional real looking sounding AI conversations.
(This story has been refiled to take away an earlier reference to OpenAI not instantly offering remark in paragraph 12)
