Weekly Hosts Create Cringey AI Voices to Spoof Awards Shows, Proving the Technology's Limitations
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Who? Weekly hosts Lindsey Weber and Bobby Finger created AI-generated versions of their show's "What's Rita Up To?" segment for their live tour, showing how AI fails to properly emulate their style of commentary
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For their year-end podcast episode, they made fake voice clones of celebrities like Glen Powell, Sydney Sweeney, Lady Gaga, and Timothée Chalamet delivering awkward "awards show" banter to parody both AI and actual celebrity interactions
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Creating the bits took a lot more human effort than expected - the AI tools didn't save them any time and the results sounded obviously fake, proving the technology has a long way to go
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Weber and Finger don't plan on regularly using AI voices on their show in the future, as the novelty would quickly wear off and undermine the authenticity listeners expect
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The response was mostly positive, though some listeners were uncomfortable with any AI use at all, given legitimate concerns about its impact on creative industries