For months, callers to the Washington state Department of Licensing who have requested automated service in Spanish have instead heard an AI voice speaking English in a strong Spanish accent. The agency has since apologized and says it’s trying to fix the problem.
AI is putting threatening to put The Onion out of business, not because The Onion articles can be written by AI, rather AI has just made this kind of satire nearly obsolete. The Onion is forced to retreat into existential screaming into the void humor, which they have done magnificently in the face of an unstoppable foe. The Onion will prevail and outlive AI though, mark my words!
This is hilarious. I work on translation software and know exactly what’s wrong. They’ve selected a spanish voice, but not translated the content to spanish. I was playing around with these settings in our software and produced exactly this result.
It’d be hilarious if you could choose that as an option. I’d like to pick between a hundred different accents. lol
You can do this with a good deal of TTS programs.
It can be very funny to give a paragraph in English to a Portuguese or Japanese or French TTS model.
Back in the 80s, my dad worked with telephone testing equipment and had reason to bring home a DecTalk. I spent so much time fucking around with that thing. Typing things like “sheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeit” was so hilarious. I’d write entire scripts.
I guess the tech is to the point now where I could lose days to it now. lol.