Amazon has demonstrated that its intelligent voice assistant Alexa is now capable of reproducing almost any human voice, including that of a deceased person, opening up a whole new field of possibilities.
During the firm's re:MARS conference in Las Vegas, Amazon caused a sensation with this new feature that can recreate the voice of a deceased person. In the demonstration, a child is told the story of "The Wizard of Oz" by their deceased grandmother. Following this request, Alexa's synthesized voice gives way to the more human voice of a person known to the listener.
According to those in charge of the research program that led to this feat, less than a minute of audio recorded by any individual is now enough to reproduce an approximate voice, thanks to advances in artificial intelligence.
For the moment, the feature is still in the development stage and there is absolutely no indication that it will be available to users anytime soon. Nevertheless, it opens up some pretty crazy possibilities, like being able to chat and ask questions to deceased loved ones.
The basic idea is, in fact, to be able to reproduce anyone's voice from simple sound recordings. Here, it is members of the same family who are involved, but such a process could also lead to misuse. Behind the idea of perpetuating the memory of a lost loved one, this technology raises many ethical questions, and that's not to mention the potential shock of hearing the voice of a deceased relative speaking once again.
In a similar vein, find out how you can chat with William Shatner, even when he's no longer alive.
