Amazon’s Alexa can soon mimic the voice of your loved ones, even after their death. Here’s more on the new feature.
Alexa can mimic the voice of your dead family members
Amazon revealed Alexa’s new capability at Amazon’s Re: Mars conference in Las Vegas. According to the firm, this new development will allow your virtual assistant to mimic the voice of a specific person in under a minute of provided recordings. According to Rohit Prasad, the desire behind this feature was to build trust in the interactions users have with Alexa. Prasad is the head scientist for Alexa and the senior vice president.
“These attributes have become even more important during the ongoing pandemic when so many of us have lost ones that we love. While AI can’t eliminate that pain of loss, it can definitely make their memories last,” stated Prasad.
In a video played at the event, a young child asks, “Alexa, can Grandma finish reading me the Wizard of Oz?”. Soon Alexa acknowledges the request and switches to a voice that mimics the child’s grandmother. The voice assistant then continues reading the book in the grandmother’s voice.
More on the new AI features
Amazon’s new development comes as Microsoft revealed it was scaling back the synthetic voice offerings. Microsoft is setting strict guidelines ensuring the “active participation of the speaker”. “This technology has exciting potential in education, accessibility, and entertainment. And yet it is also easy to imagine how it could be used to inappropriately impersonate speakers and deceive listeners,” stated Natasha Crampton. Crampton is heading Microsoft’s AI ethics division.
According to Prasad, Amazon is aiming to “make the memories last”. After all, “so many of us have lost someone we love” due to COVID. He added that their goal is “not to be confused with the all-knowing, all-capable, uber artificial general intelligence”.
