So we start with this experiment on Polish radio: the manager fires the staff and puts AI voices on to introduce music and even host chat shows, and in the case that blew up, interview a dead celebrity, a Nobel Prize winning poet.
(For those without access, a brief snippet:
The technology-enabled resurrection of the dead poet was part of a novel experiment by Off Radio Krakow, an arm of Poland’s public broadcasting system in the southern city of Krakow. The aim was to test whether A.I. could revive a moribund local station that had “close to zero” listeners, according to the head of public radio in Krakow.
The station also planned from-the-grave interviews with other dead people, including Jozef Pilsudski, Poland’s leader when it regained its independence in 1918.
Novelty value — and a storm of public outrage — worked to bolster Off Radio Krakow’s audience, which the head of Radio Krakow said grew to 8,000 overnight from just a handful of people after the introduction of three A.I.-generated Generation Z presenters — Emilia, 20, Jakub, 22, and Alex, 23, each of whom had a computer-generated photograph and biography on [the station’s website]
Although the experiment was done with the permission of the dead person’s estate, after the fact they weren’t so pleased, complaining that the (realistic) voice did not have the warmth or humor of the actual person.
OK, so AI is still in its infancy, and there will surely be more of these types of experiments to come. Some, presumably will be better. After all, who can’t imagine a museum exhibit where you get to talk with the actual Abraham Lincoln? Just train up an AI module of everything ever written, everything ever known about Honest Abe, and let it go. Want to chat with John Lennon? Insert a dollar into the slot.
I, for one, would be fascinated to have conversations with some of the Founding Fathers (and even Mothers, although there would be far less training material there). For instance, I would like to ask Thomas Jefferson “While your vision of America was largely of pastoral farmers and an agrarian society, how do you think it has turned out?”
I’d like to ask George Washington “Did you really retire after two terms as a shining example of relinquishing power peacefully to promote a constitutional democracy, or were you eximply exhausted?”
And I’d sure like to ask someone “What did you really mean by ‘A well regulated militia’.