OpenAI Removes Voice That Sounds Like Scarlett Johansson After Backlash

• ChatGPT has decided to remove its newly introduced AI voice after users noted that it sounds a lot like Scarlett Johansson from the movie Her"
• Sam Altman had previously reached out to the actress to seek permission to use her voice, which she denied.
• The company then ran auditions and reviewed 400+ submissions before finalizing the top 5 voices. The entire process took about 5 months.

ChatGPT has decided to remove a voice called Sky" after some users noted that it sounds a lot like Scarlett Johansson's voice from the movie Her"-a movie about Artificial Intelligence starring Joaquin Phoenix in lead role. In case you didn't know, these voices are used to read out ChatGPT responses.

We've heard questions about how we chose the voices in ChatGPT, especially Sky. We are working to pause the use of Sky while we address them." - OpenAI

The controversy started when last week the company launched a bunch of new products, including new AI voices, ChatGPT-4o, and a desktop version of ChatGPT.

Sky' Is Flirting with Users

The likeness of the voice is not the only concern. Sky" is also designed to be a little flirtatious, which did not go down well for some users, and rightly so. Think about it: isn't it icky to have AI flirt?

It seemed to laugh and giggle at everything. For instance, it said things like, Wow, that's quite an outfit you have got on" or something along the lines of Stop you are making me blush."

Some users pointed out on X that it sounded like a woman written by a man."Another said that there's no need for the voice to be this flirtatious and obsequious.

Well, OpenAI has a response for this, too. It said that when looking for the right voice, it wantedsomething that sounded approachable, charismatic, and timeless.

It further said that all the voice actors were informed of the firm's vision before the project was finalized, meaning they all knew what they were signing up for.

Is It Really Scarlett Johansson's Voice?

Although users seem to feel there's an uncanny resemblance, OpenAI says it's not actually ScarJo's voice. All the five voices that were introduced recently, which include Juniper, Ember, Cove, Breeze, and Sky, were recorded by professional voice artists.

Over 400 submissions were received, of which a group of 14 was selected and then an internal committee selected the final 5. The entire process lasted around five months.

The company also added that it cannot reveal the names of the actual artists to protect their privacy. However, there's a lot more to this story, and this is where it gets super interesting.

According to the Scarlett Johansson, Altman had approached her nine months ago to convince her to license her voice to OpenAI. However, Scarlett denied the offer due to personal reasons."

Then just two days before the launch, Altman contacted Johansson's team requesting her to reconsider her decision. However, there was no reply from the actress or her team, and OpenAI simply went ahead with its launch event.

Sure enough, just minutes after the live demonstration, users began posting online that the new AI voice sounds a lot like Scarlett Johansson. Adding fuel to the fire is a X post by Sam Altman on 13th May which simply read her."

Now, even though this is just a presumption, it's highly likely that this was a reference to the movie Her." It goes to show that Altman was well aware of what he was doing. Perhaps he wanted some glory for copying Johansson's voice without permission?

However, OpenAI can now land in legal trouble for this stunt. Johansson's legal team has sent out two letters to OpenAI asking it to disclose how it built an AI voice similar to the actress.

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." - Scarlett Johansson

It's also worth noting that this is a time when deepfakes and AI have made it difficult for people, especially artists, to protect their likeness, work, and identities. In fact, sexually explicit deepfake images of Taylor Swift went viral in January this year, drawing the attention of U.S. lawmakers.

When Is OpenAI's Voice Mode Coming Out?

Despite all the controversies surrounding ChatGPT's voice resemblance, the company is looking forward to launching the Voice Mode in the coming weeks.

According to a blog post by the company, paid users will get early access to this feature-and more voices will also be added in due course of time. Speaking of its capabilities, the Voice Mode can perform a number of tasks, such as:

• Read out a bedtime story
• Sing the story
• Help calm a person before a public speech
• Analyze the visual expressions of a person to comment on their emotional state

OpenAI also said that the voices will provide quick replies to your queries. In its own words, it will take as little as 232 milliseconds" and an average of 320 milliseconds, which is almost as quick as a human response.

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