news Erica Lindbeck Quits Twitter, May Leave Voice Acting over AI tomfoolery...

[OwlChemist81]

Man, this really hurts if true. Her characters on Toonami shows and Smiling Friends may have to be recast because of AI bros...

AI SUCKS!

[Jman]

Yes, yes it has sir.  I think people are so enthralled by the fancy new toy that is AI, coupled with the erroneous that everyone in the public space is rich, that it’s viewed as a victimless crime.  You know, this shit.

And because there’s no such thing as nuance, this happens.  Actors starring in non-union work are not making the same money as the heartless corporations.

That’s Futaba’s VA from Persona 5.  She doesn’t deserve this.

Edited July 8, 2023 by Jman

[OwlChemist81]

5 minutes ago, Jman said:

Yes, yes it has sir.  I think people are so enthralled by the fancy new toy that is AI, coupled with the erroneous that everyone in the public space is rich, that it’s viewed as a victimless crime.  You know, this shit.

And because there’s no such thing as nuance, this happens.  Actors starring in non-union work are not making the same money as the heartless corporations.

That’s Futaba’s VA from Persona 5.  She doesn’t deserve this.

As I briefly covered in the tags, she was also secondary characters in FLCL Alternative and MHA Season 6. Let's all hope she can shrug off this AI nonsense and return for FLCL Shoegaze and MHA Season 7, not to mention Smiling Friends Season 2!

[Blatch]

Where'd you see something saying she might quit? Seems a little overblown to me. Hopefully she uses this time to cool down and gets the support she needs.

Also, it's unfortunate that this happens to a VA shortly after another one posts this, which reinforces the point nicely:

 

[PokeNirvash]

I don't know what exactly's going on, but yeah, people are dicks.

15 minutes ago, Blatch said:

Where'd you see something saying she might quit? Seems a little overblown to me. Hopefully she uses this time to cool down and gets the support she needs.

Agreed wholeheartedly.

[Toonamiguy321]

I think one of the worst things VAs can do in the face of random people playing with AI voices is have a big meltdown like this. Pandora’s box is open, AI is never going back in the box. One of the first AI voices I saw people training years ago was Carl. I don’t know if Dave Willis has had an opinion on the matter, but he never made a big deal out of it either. And thus people had their laughs, got bored, and moved onto other toys to play with. Reacting like this leads to it never going away for that person. 
 

Now, if this was a dubbing studio using an AI clone of someone’s voice to do official voicework so they don’t have to pay the VA, that’s when it’s the right time to be upset. But randos on the Internet making your anime character say funny things? If the music industry can’t stop people from pirating music, there is no way to stop people from pirating your voice. And it’s not just VAs, there are people doing AIs for tons of famous people. I’m sure we have all heard the Trump/Biden/Obama CoD lobby AI. There is no stopping this.

[Jman]

This stuff needs to be regulated.  It’s one thing to have a laugh at Trump, Biden and Obama debating the best Zelda games, it’s another for a VA to not have employment because AI has replaced her.  Not to mention false flags that are now possible.

[PenguinBoss]

2 hours ago, OwlChemist81 said:

Man, this really hurts if true. Her characters on Toonami shows and Smiling Friends may have to be recast because of AI bros...

I wasn't aware being active on Twitter was in her contract.

[CountFrylock]

55 minutes ago, Toonamiguy321 said:

I think one of the worst things VAs can do in the face of random people playing with AI voices is have a big meltdown like this. Pandora’s box is open, AI is never going back in the box. One of the first AI voices I saw people training years ago was Carl. I don’t know if Dave Willis has had an opinion on the matter, but he never made a big deal out of it either. And thus people had their laughs, got bored, and moved onto other toys to play with. Reacting like this leads to it never going away for that person. 
 

Now, if this was a dubbing studio using an AI clone of someone’s voice to do official voicework so they don’t have to pay the VA, that’s when it’s the right time to be upset. But randos on the Internet making your anime character say funny things? If the music industry can’t stop people from pirating music, there is no way to stop people from pirating your voice. And it’s not just VAs, there are people doing AIs for tons of famous people. I’m sure we have all heard the Trump/Biden/Obama CoD lobby AI. There is no stopping this.

This is such a bad take and you know it....voice actors deserve more respect they shouldn't have to be worried about machines taking work away from them because selfish morons on youtube have normalized AI voice replication

[[classic swim]]

Ingrates already had serious lack of respect for the profession of voice acting, and this AI shit has only made that conversation ten times worse.

I’ve seen videos where more humble VAs making less money in the industry would have their voices lazily automated to narrate. Then the actors would see them and be like “yeah, I had no involvement and it’s unprofessional to use me in this way instead of reaching out.”

 

Things have gone too far. I can’t say for sure that I’ve seen the worst yet or not, because there’s always next week. But the humans actually working in the field should be outraged or at the very least put off by what’s being used. And something should be done.

Edited July 8, 2023 by [classic swim]

[Toonamiguy321]

1 hour ago, Jman said:

This stuff needs to be regulated.  It’s one thing to have a laugh at Trump, Biden and Obama debating the best Zelda games, it’s another for a VA to not have employment because AI has replaced her.  Not to mention false flags that are now possible.

How do you regulate it? You can stop corporations from abusing it, which is good, but most times when we see a VA meltdown like this, it’s over a fan project. There is no way you can regulate stuff like that. 
 

1 hour ago, CountFrylock said:

This is such a bad take and you know it....voice actors deserve more respect they shouldn't have to be worried about machines taking work away from them because selfish morons on youtube have normalized AI voice replication

It might sound bad if you didn’t read it, which based on your response, you did not. I clearly stated if corporations use the technology to deprive VAs of roles, then there is a problem. A fan of a series training an AI to make a character say some kind of joke deprived no one of work, as it’s unlikely the person would have hired the person to say it themselves or if the VA would even be willing to say the lines in the first place. 
 

But please, offer up a solution that will stop random internet people from training AI voices. It would be a billion dollar idea minimum. 

[Jman]

Quote

How do you regulate it? You can stop corporations from abusing it, which is good, but most times when we see a VA meltdown like this, it’s over a fan project. There is no way you can regulate stuff like that. 

Apparently SAG-AFTRA as part of their negotiations want their voices to be recognized as intellectual property, which means their unauthorized use would allow lawsuits.

[PokeNirvash]

Remember when the biggest problem with union dubs were that it meant Steve Blum and Crispin Freeman couldn't be in Bleach?

I yearn for those simpler times.

[Toonamiguy321]

19 minutes ago, Jman said:

Apparently SAG-AFTRA as part of their negotiations want their voices to be recognized as intellectual property, which means their unauthorized use would allow lawsuits.

I can’t imagine any judge approving such a thing. How do you determine what a voice is? Are those Tiktok Roiland impersonators stealing intellectual property when they drop a IM MR MEESEEKS LOOK AT ME? There is 8 billion people on the planet, some are bound to sound similar. And if such a regulation ever passed, AI trainers would just claim the voice being used is a consenting individual that sounds very similar. People will always find a way around, it reminds me of when The Pokemon Company gave Diives shit for making Pokémon smut. Rather than stop, he just made a bunch of OC donut steel Pokemon that look near identical to the originals with different names and kept going. 

What makes this whole situation ridiculous is it was an UNMONETIZED video. And to my original point, calling attention to it like this made it significantly more popular over just ignoring it. And from what I gather from others, rather than doing a DMCA takedown like a normal person, she instead tried to mobilize her fans to attack the uploader. A lot of blunders here.

[CountFrylock]

1 hour ago, Toonamiguy321 said:

How do you regulate it? You can stop corporations from abusing it, which is good, but most times when we see a VA meltdown like this, it’s over a fan project. There is no way you can regulate stuff like that. 
 

It might sound bad if you didn’t read it, which based on your response, you did not. I clearly stated if corporations use the technology to deprive VAs of roles, then there is a problem. A fan of a series training an AI to make a character say some kind of joke deprived no one of work, as it’s unlikely the person would have hired the person to say it themselves or if the VA would even be willing to say the lines in the first place. 
 

But please, offer up a solution that will stop random internet people from training AI voices. It would be a billion dollar idea minimum. 

AI Voice replication needs to be nipped in the bud before it spirals out of control

this isn't a children's toy....AI Voice Replication can be used to make horribly racist and homophobic things come out of anyone's voice you want it to be

at that point it's no longer a joke and is possibly ruining somebody's career

so it isn't   just the idea of being replaced by ai voices that scares them it's the idea that you could get into hot water over something you didn't even say

because some internet trolls paid a monthly fee to access AI Voice technology

Edited July 9, 2023 by CountFrylock

[Toonamiguy321]

21 minutes ago, CountFrylock said:

AI Voice replication needs to be nipped in the bud before it spirals out of control

The time for that was about 3 years ago when people were fighting an uphill battle to get Carl to say something even halfway passable. The tech, just like AI art, is widely available to the public now and advancing more every day. Another one not getting talked about as much because none of them are free - AI nudifiers. All it takes is one decent bikini picture off social media to create a convincing nude that the only way you could disprove is by putting out actual nudes. Expect to see more about that once they become free to use.

25 minutes ago, CountFrylock said:

this isn't a children's toy....AI Voice Replication can be used to make horribly racist and homophobic things come out of anyone's voice you want it to be

at that point it's no longer a joke and is possibly ruining somebody's career

so it isn't   just the idea of being replaced by ai voices that scares them it's the idea that you could get into hot water over something you didn't even say

because some internet trolls paid a monthly fee to access AI Voice technology

In regards to this, I think this will have an opposite effect. Every person with a voice is going to have an Uncle Ruckus style clip with gratuitous use of the N-word. No one will believe any of them are real. Which mean, if someone famous actually does have an N word tape out there, it will also be easily waved off as an AI fake. 
 

Think about it like this, if Nixon were president today, the Watergate scandal would not have forced him to resign, he would just shrug it off as a fake. That’s where the real trouble will be, knowing it’s easy to make a fake means we have to assume everything we hear is fake. 

[CountFrylock]

3 hours ago, [classic swim] said:

Ingrates already had serious lack of respect for the profession of voice acting, and this AI shit has only made that conversation ten times worse.

I’ve seen videos where more humble VAs making less money in the industry would have their voices lazily automated to narrate. Then the actors would see them and be like “yeah, I had no involvement and it’s unprofessional to use me in this way instead of reaching out.”

 

Things have gone too far. I can’t say for sure that I’ve seen the worst yet or not, because there’s always next week. But the humans actually working in the field should be outraged or at the very least put off by what’s being used. And something should be done.

something should be done....anyone who disagrees might as well say "I'm In Favor of robots taking  every role in every animated movie tv show and video game"

 

55 minutes ago, Toonamiguy321 said:

The time for that was about 3 years ago when people were fighting an uphill battle to get Carl to say something even halfway passable. The tech, just like AI art, is widely available to the public now and advancing more every day. Another one not getting talked about as much because none of them are free - AI nudifiers. All it takes is one decent bikini picture off social media to create a convincing nude that the only way you could disprove is by putting out actual nudes. Expect to see more about that once they become free to use.

In regards to this, I think this will have an opposite effect. Every person with a voice is going to have an Uncle Ruckus style clip with gratuitous use of the N-word. No one will believe any of them are real. Which mean, if someone famous actually does have an N word tape out there, it will also be easily waved off as an AI fake. 
 

Think about it like this, if Nixon were president today, the Watergate scandal would not have forced him to resign, he would just shrug it off as a fake. That’s where the real trouble will be, knowing it’s easy to make a fake means we have to assume everything we hear is fake. 

three years ago we were busy with this big thing...oh what was it again? Oh Yeah! The Pandemic

i think people were more preoccupied with trying to steer clear of covid-19 and navigating the dumpster fires caused by it than anything else....

Not sure i agree with your belief that everything will be seen as a fake and criminals will be able to get away with making threats because "It's Just AI Trolling Bro" leading everyone to think everything is a prank including bomb threats

Edited July 9, 2023 by CountFrylock

[Toonamiguy321]

8 minutes ago, CountFrylock said:

three years ago we were busy with this big thing...oh what was it again? Oh Yeah! The Pandemic

i think people were more preoccupied with trying to steer clear of covid-19 and navigating the dumpster fires caused by it than anything else....

You mean that thing where all of society had months and months of free time to jack around on the internet? Covid is a big reason this AI tech advanced as fast as it did, lots of people had time to sit down and work on it. 
 

9 minutes ago, CountFrylock said:

Not sure i agree with your belief that everything will be seen as a fake and criminals will be able to get away with making threats because "It's Just AI Trolling Bro" leading everyone to think everything is a prank including bomb threats

Completely moving the goalposts from racist tirades to terroristic threats. Authorities will always treat terroristic threats with some level of legitimacy and follow up on them. AI is not giving people the ability to make threats, that’s existed since the telephone, and when you get caught, you go to jail. 
 

If a tape dropped tomorrow where Biden goes on a 10 minute rant about how much he hates black people, who would believe that? I don’t think even hardcore anti Biden types would believe it’s real rather than AI. If this technology was actually effective for that, weaponizing it politically would have been the first thing it was used for. 

[CountFrylock]

48 minutes ago, Toonamiguy321 said:

You mean that thing where all of society had months and months of free time to jack around on the internet? Covid is a big reason this AI tech advanced as fast as it did, lots of people had time to sit down and work on it. 
 

Completely moving the goalposts from racist tirades to terroristic threats. Authorities will always treat terroristic threats with some level of legitimacy and follow up on them. AI is not giving people the ability to make threats, that’s existed since the telephone, and when you get caught, you go to jail. 
 

If a tape dropped tomorrow where Biden goes on a 10 minute rant about how much he hates black people, who would believe that? I don’t think even hardcore anti Biden types would believe it’s real rather than AI. If this technology was actually effective for that, weaponizing it politically would have been the first thing it was used for. 

 

Okay Here's my problem

You Think People Should Have Stopped this three years ago when it was barely a blip on the radar....i don't even think voice actors started noticing it until the influx of AI Videos hit youtube

nobody was gonna see one shit-post video and make an entire movement to stop something which had not happened yet

especially since flushing money down the toilet monthly for casual shit-posting seemed like a very niche idea....not one that would eventually flood social media

and also you are the one that said "Knowing it's easy to make a fake means we have to assume everything is fake"  You Can't just backpedal and say well not exactly....

when you say assume everything is fake  you mean everything

the word everything means "Everything" there's no exception

 

Edited July 9, 2023 by CountFrylock

[Toonamiguy321]

48 minutes ago, CountFrylock said:

Okay Here's my problem

You Think People Should Have Stopped this three years ago when it was barely a blip on the radar....i don't even think voice actors started noticing it until the influx of AI Videos hit youtube

nobody was gonna see one shit-post video and make an entire movement to stop something which had not happened yet

especially since flushing money down the toilet monthly for casual shit-posting seemed like a very niche idea....not one that would eventually flood social media

You stated that it needed to be “nipped in the bud” and 3 years ago was when it was a bud. It’s now a full grown forest, and all people have is a handsaw to fight it. It’s not going away. 
 

50 minutes ago, CountFrylock said:

and also you are the one that said "Knowing it's easy to make a fake means we have to assume everything is fake"  You Can't just backpedal and say well not exactly....

when you say assume everything is fake  you mean everything

the word everything means "Everything" there's no exception

 

I assumed we were talking about exclusively things AI could be used for to cause people problems, such as using their voice to say something racist or admit to some crime they are suspected of doing. Everything verbal now has to be taken with a grain of salt, especially if it’s coming from someone high profile who has ample voice clips that could be used to train an AI. 

Obviously, my mistake here was assuming common sense was common. I should have known better. 

[CountFrylock]

if it was a full grown forest then we'd have already seen voice actors being replaced by ai programs and video games/movies/tv shows being completely written by them

but that isn't the case so stop acting like It is....

if you had any common sense You wouldn't call Erica Lindbeck's reaction a meltdown....She didn't deserve AI Bro's Shit-talking her

 

Edited July 9, 2023 by CountFrylock

[CountFrylock]

4 hours ago, PokeNirvash said:

Remember when the biggest problem with union dubs were that it meant Steve Blum and Crispin Freeman couldn't be in Bleach?

I yearn for those simpler times.

I Yearn for when A.I Shit-Posting didn't show us the way to lazy casting..."Replace everyone with robots in the next video game/animated movie/tv show!"

 

[Toonamiguy321]

1 hour ago, CountFrylock said:

if it was a full grown forest then we'd have already seen voice actors being replaced by ai programs and video games/movies/tv shows being completely written by them

I’m only talking about voice replication. Content being written by AI is actually much further down the road. Voice actors already had some protections in place that could be argued in court extend to AI. For example, a studio can’t record dialog once and just recycle it across multiple products without giving the VA some form of compensation. That’s good for video game adaptations of an anime so the game studio can’t just rip iconic lines from the anime for their game. 

VAs seem to think by simply saying they don’t allow people to use their voice to train AIs that it suddenly makes everyone stop. It doesn’t, and it never will. It stops major companies from training an AI with their voice to use in future projects, but it doesn’t stop a memelord from making memes for a laugh. 
 

Unless I’m not getting the facts, it looks like a meltdown to me. Here’s my TLDR on the situation, set me straight if I’m wrong

- someone makes a non monetized Persona meme video using AI Erica voice

- Erica requests that her followers attack the uploader 

- People retaliate and she quits Twitter after realizing not everyone is on her side on the matter. 
 

Absolutely comical to see someone like Little Kuriboh have an opinion on this topic when his entire claim to fame is using animation he did NOT have permission from the rights holder to use to make his YouTube series. 

[CountFrylock]

10 minutes ago, Toonamiguy321 said:

I’m only talking about voice replication. Content being written by AI is actually much further down the road. Voice actors already had some protections in place that could be argued in court extend to AI. For example, a studio can’t record dialog once and just recycle it across multiple products without giving the VA some form of compensation. That’s good for video game adaptations of an anime so the game studio can’t just rip iconic lines from the anime for their game. 

VAs seem to think by simply saying they don’t allow people to use their voice to train AIs that it suddenly makes everyone stop. It doesn’t, and it never will. It stops major companies from training an AI with their voice to use in future projects, but it doesn’t stop a memelord from making memes for a laugh. 
 

Unless I’m not getting the facts, it looks like a meltdown to me. Here’s my TLDR on the situation, set me straight if I’m wrong

- someone makes a non monetized Persona meme video using AI Erica voice

- Erica requests that her followers attack the uploader 

- People retaliate and she quits Twitter after realizing not everyone is on her side on the matter. 
 

Absolutely comical to see someone like Little Kuriboh have an opinion on this topic when his entire claim to fame is using animation he did NOT have permission from the rights holder to use to make his YouTube series. 

uh wtf...she didn't request her followers assault the uploader

so please knock it off with that crap

i saw the tweet and nowhere does she say "Attack Them My Loyal Followers!" or anything implying that

Edited July 9, 2023 by CountFrylock

[Toonamiguy321]

1 hour ago, CountFrylock said:

uh wtf...she didn't request her followers assault the uploader

so please knock it off with that crap

i saw the tweet and nowhere does she say "Attack Them My Loyal Followers!" or anything implying that

It sounds to me like she made a naive mistake and requested her followers report the video, not realizing people would take it as a battle cry to attack the uploader. Especially since it’s AI related, which is a hot button topic and will encourage people to get aggressive fast. She probably didn’t mean for this to happen this way, but not knowing isn’t an excuse. Requesting a DMCA takedown was the right course of action here and would have resulted in very little, if any pushback. 

[[classic swim]]

4 hours ago, Toonamiguy321 said:

It sounds to me like she made a naive mistake and requested her followers report the video, not realizing people would take it as a battle cry to attack the uploader. 

In fairness, that’s a huge jump from outright requesting to attack the uploader.

You can have your own opinion about an AI fan video being mass reported, and you absolutely should think the lowest of everyone on the internet these days.

But most online would only like to believe their followers are not parasocial sheep, and can do things the adult way if they truly cared. That naive behavior is not something exclusive to just Erica. Some broken heads out there would go by any little excuse to start dishing out the unfathomable. Both could’ve easily been harassed if that’s where you’re getting at, which looks like just that happened.

And there’s only so much responsibility you can take *if at all* for some fucked up rando choosing to go completely out of line.

[Sketch]

I take Erica’s example as her saying “if you see this sort of thing please report it” because she can’t spend all day tracking down every possible exploitation of her vocal performances.

Might have been better not to link to a specific example but I think the point was to show how real it sounded and to get many people to report that video as well. If she was the only one to report it or she only told a select few in private to report it then it potentially would not get taken down. Likewise had she asked the video maker privately to remove the video there’s no guarantee they would do so.

Either way, she definitely didn’t tell people to harass the video maker and she absolutely didn’t deserve the shit storm she got from making that tweet. I don’t think she’s leaving acting over this but fuck all those assholes who attacked her.

I mean how would you like it if someone trained an AI to sound like you and used that to quote a tirade from Uncle Ruckus or spoke in great detail of having sex with a child or something? Who would be comfortable with that?

[Toonamiguy321]

2 hours ago, Sketch said:

I mean how would you like it if someone trained an AI to sound like you and used that to quote a tirade from Uncle Ruckus or spoke in great detail of having sex with a child or something? Who would be comfortable with that?

Nobody was doing this. But she has effectively Streisand’d herself into having those types of things made over bringing excess attention to a harmless, unmonetized fan project. 

She may not have intended for this to turn into an attack, but ignorance of how the internet works doesn’t change the final result. Asking people to report the video emboldens die hard anti AI types to take a more aggressive approach, and then the AI fans perceive it as a full blown attack headed by the VA in question and respond with an attack of their own. Nobody in the scenario is right, but that’s how it goes. 

I wonder how VAs will react when people start using AI of their voices for SFM porn with characters they voiced. Cause that’s probably what’s coming next and also something that won’t be able to be controlled. 

[Jman]

Considering SAG-AFTRA is going on strike tomorrow if their concerns about AI aren’t addressed, I’d wager “not well.”

[Sketch]

1 hour ago, Toonamiguy321 said:

Nobody was doing this. But she has effectively Streisand’d herself into having those types of things made over bringing excess attention to a harmless, unmonetized fan project. 

She may not have intended for this to turn into an attack, but ignorance of how the internet works doesn’t change the final result. Asking people to report the video emboldens die hard anti AI types to take a more aggressive approach, and then the AI fans perceive it as a full blown attack headed by the VA in question and respond with an attack of their own. Nobody in the scenario is right, but that’s how it goes. 

I wonder how VAs will react when people start using AI of their voices for SFM porn with characters they voiced. Cause that’s probably what’s coming next and also something that won’t be able to be controlled. 

She has every right to try to protect her voice even from “harmless” fan projects using AI to have Futaba sing about dick pics and pictures of the Harry Potter kids fucking each other in this instance.

[Toonamiguy321]

54 minutes ago, Sketch said:

She has every right to try to protect her voice even from “harmless” fan projects using AI to have Futaba sing about dick pics and pictures of the Harry Potter kids fucking each other in this instance.

Sure she has the right to try. But attempts will simply embolden others to use her voice to do other things, knowing that it agitates her. Oh, did I say her voice? I meant using the voice of Merica Blindbeck, an anonymous person whose voice sounds VERY similar, but has given her full permission for its usage. 
 

You can fight a dub studio replacing your paid roles with AI. You can’t fight the Internet making memes. The once single upload video on one channel is now uploaded onto various channels and will surely be uploaded to more in the coming days. If this is the result “protecting her voice” I think the better option would have just been to keep quiet. 

[Daos]

Honestly, she should have just ignored it. The video has 12k views even after the controversy. Now she's kicked the hornets nest of human garbage that is Twitter and gotten harassed to the point where she felt the need to delete her account.

Legally, all these AI covers are probably protected and won't be going away.

Now if someone is using the AI to misrepresent themselves as the actual person, then something can be done. But other than that it's all fair use and parody protected.

[Daos]

On an unrelated note, has anyone seen this amazing new singer Austrian Painter? There's just something about his voice that really sweeps me away. I wonder if he has a fan club I can join?