AI is coming for your job, your intellect, and now, it’s even out to steal the likeness of Robin Williams to make it seem more relatable and human. At what point do we say it’s gone far enough?
Using AI, human replication has come leaps and bounds. It’s now possible to emulate real people, making them look like they’re saying and doing things they never have. Uncanny videos appear on my feed every day of people like Warren Buffett promising their secrets for a monthly subscription. Recently, I’ve even seen takeaways using AI to make it look like celebrities have come in and grabbed a quick shwarma.
Now, Matthew Lawrence, who starred alongside Robin Williams in Mrs. Doubtfire, wants to use AI to bring his voice to driving directions. “I would love to do something really special with his voice, because I know for a generation, that voice is just so iconic,” he told Entertainment Weekly.
“It’s not just the fact that I knew him and worked with him,” he explained. “It’s in my head, it’s in everybody’s head, and it would be so cool.”
Leave Robin Alone
I understand his desire to use the voice of Robin Williams and let AI turn it into a voiceover. But it feels disrespectful. In the same way that using AI to replicate Ghibli art, using his voice is not only an insult to the work he put into his image, but also to his memory.
Would Robin Williams have offered to do a voiceover for a map app while alive? By using his voice post mortem, that option is taken away from him. He will be associated with the company whether he likes it or not.
It’s the same as using AI to replicate any artist to produce their work after their life has ended. Would it be acceptable to emulate Picasso or Divinci to paint the front of a building? Robin Williams’ voice was a part of his art, honed and perfected throughout his life. Reducing it to code, to be used for any old buyer, is deeply disrespectful to his years of dedication.
He still needs permission from the family to use Robin Williams through an AI. Hopefully, they shut it down rather than looking at the money.