If this is OpenAI’s idea of how an actual human woman should behave, it’s no wonder the company thought it could get away with using a voice that sounded alarmingly close to that of actress Scarlett Johansson — without her permission.
When OpenAI demoed its new artificial intelligence assistant Sky last week, the company’s engineers made sure to showcase the attributes that they thought made it seem uncannily life-like.
The female-sounding voice they conversed with was ego-stroking (“Wow, that’s quite the outfit you’ve got on!”); accommodating and subservient (“How can I brighten your day today?”); flirty and giggly (“Oh, stop it, you’re making me blush!”). The company had even added a feature that allowed users to interrupt the model (“You can just butt in whenever you want,” noted one of the presenters).
