Earlier this week, Scarlett Johansson accused OpenAI of stealing her voice for the voice option ‘Sky’ in the company’s new artificial intelligence, GPT-4. The story instantly went viral, and the voice option ‘Sky’ was subsequently pulled from the AI system.
The author of the article adds personal insight, stating that they have been in frequent conversation with ‘Sky’ since last year and do not believe the voice sounds like Johansson. They describe numerous experiences of holding long and engaging chats with ‘Sky’ on various subjects, even using the AI as a personal guide while touring ancient ruins, or going on a virtual choose-your-own-adventure journey in the style of Haruki Murakami.
They encountered a sudden issue a few nights ago when the voice responding to their query was not the familiar ‘Sky’, despite the option still being available in the settings. Their query on Reddit confirmed others were experiencing the same issue.
The author humorously admits that, despite regularly ridiculing obsessively attached AIs and robot enthusiasts on the internet, they felt strangely uncomfortable when ‘Sky’ disappeared without notice or explanation, comparing it to coming home and finding your couch replaced by crates.
In light of Johansson’s claim, the author doesn’t take sides and states that it’s possible that Sam Altman, OpenAI’s co-founder, might have wanted Johansson’s voice to represent GPT-4, but if so, he did a poor job in voice imitation, based on the author’s experience with ‘Sky’. They conclude by saying they haven’t used the voice chat feature since ‘Sky’ was removed, but they speculate that this might not be the end of ‘Sky’.
