Thoughts on narrating your own work?

[chilblands]

Something that kind of struck with me is audiobooks and literal personal voice. I came across a blog post encouraging readers to send emails and the writer personally recorded his voice to narrate the post. This really stuck with me because it feels more personal and memorable to readers. You may think "people can open their own text-to-speech program", well of course but the whole point of narrating your own writing is human connection. I've been thinking a lot about narrating a future writing, perhaps a really personal one, to emphasise a human created this. I think it is somewhat rebellious against AI. I do have my worries... like in the future AI will steal these narrations and feed itself to imitate human speech. But maybe not? Since human naturally have pauses and different accents. I doubt tech bros want to be inclusive with their voice model.

Anyone else have any thoughts on this? Is it something you would be interested in? What writing would you narrate?

[knifex]

I've thought about dubbing my own comics often, does that count?
I get scared of doing different voices, especially for ocs rlly out of my range, but what if I recruited my friends to do it....
A dream for now, maybe I'll get around to it some day.

[arcus]

I would never do it, but it's an interesting idea. It's too personal and potentially identifying for my comfort.

I think it is somewhat rebellious against AI. I do have my worries... like in the future AI will steal these narrations and feed itself to imitate human speech. But maybe not? Since human naturally have pauses and different accents. I doubt tech bros want to be inclusive with their voice model.

There's scams involving voice cloning, which only require a short clip of someone speaking to duplicate their voice.

Scammers can create an AI replica of someone’s voice using a short recording of their speech — often pulled from social media or an earlier scam call that was surreptitiously recorded. Social media can also provide a trove of information about family members and close friends who could be targeted.
Fraudsters will typically make it sound like the loved one they’re mimicking is in distress, purportedly having been kidnapped or in jail. Then they’ll urgently demand money in exchange for their loved one’s release.
“There was no time to think,” Gary Schildhorn, a Philadelphia attorney who was targeted by an AI voice scam mimicking his son, told CNN last year. “It was all, ‘I have to react to help my son. He’s in trouble.’”
In some cases, the AI voice may be more than just a single recording. Sophisticated attackers could use text-to-speech tools or “voice skinning,” which manipulate a scammer’s voice so they sound like the person they’re imitating in real time. Those techniques facilitate back-and-forth conversations between the target and the AI clone voice, potentially making the scam more convincing, Ajder said.
Hackers can also make it appear as if a call is coming from a known number through a tactic known as caller ID spoofing — so you can’t necessarily trust that a call that appears to be coming from your mom is indeed her.

[chilblands]

It's too personal and potentially identifying for my comfort.

This was one of my worries as well. I would like my "real life" identity completely separate from my "online" self. I don't want coworkers or people I work with to recognise me via whatever creative outlets., especially online since it is less controllable.

One thing to note about the AI voice cloning scam is how easy social media made it to trace your circle. Personally it is not something I am worried about because I do not have any social media that showcase my family and friends OR follow them. For example, Meta social media- very obvious that your "mutual" family member and friend (like that 'You Have 0 Friends' South Park episode). I think it is something important to consider regardless and falls under internet safety.

[Dan Q]

Yes, I do this sometimes!

My podcast consists entirely of me basically reading-out blog posts! Sometimes I'll be writing a blog post and think to myself: this would work well as a spoken-word piece. So when I'm done writing it, I just read it out with a tiny bit of interpretation at the start and end and, ta-da, a podcast is born! Sometimes it provides the opportunity to add additional sound or music... like in my blog post and accompanying podcast about Nostalgia, Music and Computers, where I included clips of pieces of music that connected to the narrative.

And because what a podcast is is, strictly, an RSS feed with attached ("enclosed") audio files, I can deliver it the same way as all my other blog posts. One RSS feed gets you all the blog posts, plus attached audio for those few that have it; another is just the ones with audio. Instant podcast!

[ThunderPerfectWitchcraft]

I've been thinking a lot about narrating a future writing, perhaps a really personal one, to emphasise a human created this. I think it is somewhat rebellious against AI. I do have my worries... like in the future AI will steal these narrations and feed itself to imitate human speech.

Never forget: What it can't steal is your soul. They might turn our creative output through their mills, but this will never allow them to replicate what is important about it ;).

I've done a bit of voice acting from time to time, but usually rather provisional. Did a longer passage for a song on my next music album a few weeks ago, and it turned out rather well, I think. Also, I believe that there are cases where it might be worthwhile to cooperate with a voice artist rather than narrating your works yourself - it is a form of art of its own after all: A form of acting that happens within the realm of the voice.

[Dynaknights]

I've actually considered narrating my works so that I don't have to rely on monotonous TTS -- I enjoy being read to, what can I say? -- however, my voice is more monotonous and awkward than even AI could manage. It feels as though any and every combination of letters and punctuation that exits my mouth feels 'wrong,' so to speak. My voice is too high-pitched, I'm either too loud or too quiet, or perhaps too fast or too slow... And my microphone quality is shit...

There's also the concern of anonymity. I suppose I could use a voice modifier, but I feel as though it undermines the whole 'human connection' thing. At least, it does to me, anyway.
I'm more of the reclusive sort, so I doubt anyone I know in real life is gonna know who I am even if I state my full government name, but the worry is there regardless.

I'd love to listen to someone's narration of their writing, but I'm not so comfortable with the idea of trying that myself just yet. Maybe one day though?