Amazon is readying its Alexa voice assistant to simulate anyone’s voice, including those of deceased family members. It is developing a system that, when introduced, will allow Alexa to simulate a human voice within a minute of listening to a recording.
Rohit Prasad, Amazon’s senior vice president, said the new features could keep memories going during the pandemic when many people lost loved ones.
Microsoft has a similar system, but recently Microsoft has limited the system. The original intention of Microsoft’s system is to help those with language barriers or other troubles, but there are concerns that perpetrators may use the system to spread false political information. Amazon’s intentions are different, and it hopes the new feature will make Alexa help shoppers.
Another Amazon executive revealed that Alexa now buy ios app installs has 100 million customers worldwide, a number that is in line with Alexa device sales. January 2019 Alexa devices officially go on sale.
Prasad explained that Alexa’s goal is to become a general intelligence, which can adapt to the environment where the user is located and learn new concepts with only a small amount of external information; but Alexa intelligence is different from omniscient and omnipotent general artificial intelligence, which cannot be divided into two. To be confused, what DeepMind and OpenAI are after is general artificial intelligence.
Amazon also demonstrated new features at the conference. In a video, a child asks Alexa if she can read “The Wizard of Oz” in her grandmother’s voice. Alexa confirms the command, modifies the voice, and then reads it at a gentle pace, the voice is indistinguishable from a real person, and there is no mechanical feeling.