James Earl Jones, the legendary actor known for his iconic voice and a remarkable career spanning over sixty years, is well-remembered for his roles as Mufasa in 'The Lion King' and Darth Vader in the 'Star Wars' series. Jones, a Tony Award winner for 'The Great White Hope' and 'Fences', had his voice replicated through AI technology to recreate classic characters, raising discussions within the industry regarding the use of AI and the rights of voice actors. This decision has led to a strike initiated by SAG-AFTRA performers, concerned about the potential for AI to replace their jobs.

Salesforce has acquired the AI voice assistant startup Tenyx to enhance the interactivity of its customer service system and meet user needs through a natural and smooth conversational experience. Tenyx's technology has been applied in various fields such as e-commerce, healthcare, and hospitality, and will become an essential part of Salesforce's customer service system. The transaction is expected to be completed by October 31, 2024, with the Tenyx team joining Salesforce to continue product development. The acquisition aims to leverage AI fully.

LG will showcase its first smart home hub ThinQ ON at the IFA 2024 technology fair. This hub integrates artificial intelligence technology, allowing it to connect and control LG appliances and third-party devices, supporting Thread, Matter, and Wi-Fi. The ThinQ ON features a compact and rounded design, doubling as a smart speaker with an integrated LG AI voice assistant that can understand natural language, interpret context, and learn user preferences to provide a personalized experience. The device is powered by a self-developed AI chipset and supports Matter certification.

LG announced the launch of its first dedicated smart home hub - ThinQ ON - ahead of IFA 2024. This compact, round white hub functions as a smart speaker and is equipped with an AI voice assistant. ThinQ ON uses advanced AI technology to control LG appliances and other smart home devices via Matter, Thread, and Wi-Fi connections, allowing for monitoring of device usage and personalized adjustments. Its Matter certification ensures compatibility with various network connections and compatibility with LG and third-party devices, enhancing the user experience.

In 2023, the scale of China's artificial intelligence software market reached 37.74 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 26.2%. The computer vision market reached 10.11 billion yuan, led by SenseTime. In the AI voice and semantic market, Baidu Smart Cloud ranked first for the first time, followed closely by iFlytek and Alibaba Cloud. The market size of machine learning development platforms was 3.51 billion yuan, with Fourth Paradigm and Huawei Cloud tied for first place, focusing on large model technology to support the development of generative AI applications.

The actors' union SAG-AFTRA has signed an agreement with AI cloning startup Narrativ, allowing actors to legally license their voices for AI-generated audio advertisements. The agreement ensures that actors have the right to understand and reject brand proposals, set prices, and negotiate for fair compensation. SAG-AFTRA's benefit plans will receive a share of the advertising revenue, though the specific percentage has not been disclosed. This agreement aims to address the widespread dissemination of AI-cloned voices without authorization, following ongoing concerns within the AI industry.

Eleven Labs has launched a fully managed AI voiceover service that helps content creators and businesses overcome cross-language communication challenges. The service supports automatic translation and voiceover in multiple languages, including Spanish, Hindi, French, Portuguese, German, Arabic, and Polish, while maintaining the original tone, timbre, and speaking style, enhancing content authenticity and relatability. A professional voice actor verification process is in place to ensure translation quality. The service supports up to 10 speakers, with an average completion time of 7 days, and can provide same-day service in urgent cases.

Today, the Beijing Internet Court heard a case regarding the infringement of personal rights due to AI-generated voices, ultimately ruling in favor of the plaintiff. The plaintiff, Yin XX, is a voice actor who discovered that his voice had been digitized and was being sold on a platform operated by the defendant, a smart technology company.

Bilibili made its debut at the 2024 World Artificial Intelligence Conference (WAIC2024), showcasing its latest self-developed AI technologies and new trends in AI-generated content. The exhibition included technologies for quickly creating digital avatars, dynamic manga techniques, and a custom AI voice library for the first Chinese virtual singer, Luo Tianyi, which drew considerable attention from the audience. As one of the most influential internet platforms in China in AI intelligence, Bilib

NBC has recently announced the introduction of an innovative technology during the upcoming 2024 Paris Olympics—using artificial intelligence (AI) voice for event commentary and reporting. This initiative marks a deep integration of sports event coverage and AI technology, promising to deliver a new viewing experience for audiences.

AI audio creation company ElevenLabs, founded by former Palantir engineers, has announced the launch of its first iOS app: 'ElevenLabs Reader: AI Audio'.

AI voice technology company SoundHound has announced its acquisition of food ordering platform Allset, a move that could fundamentally change people's dining experience. Allset claims to be a complete ecosystem for ordering food via cars, TVs, and smart devices, and this acquisition signifies that SoundHound is taking a critical step in the field of smart voice ordering.

Music streaming giant Spotify has announced the establishment of its first internal creative agency, Creative Lab, to assist brands in customizing their marketing campaigns and has begun testing generative AI ads. This move indicates that Spotify is intensifying its efforts to attract advertisers, potentially appealing to them with access to Spotify's 615 million listeners.

French startup Nijta focuses on AI-driven voice anonymization technology. Nijta's product, VoiceHarbor, enables voice anonymization while complying with data privacy regulations. The main market for Nijta is in Europe, benefiting from strict GDPR data privacy laws. The company plans to expand into the B2C market, with a focus on protecting voice messages and other related areas.

IBM researchers have discovered a relatively simple method for hijacking voice calls using generative AI tools. This finding raises concerns for organizations that rely on phone verification for identity, such as financial institutions. It poses a challenge for chatbots, as low-cost AI tools enable scammers to easily impersonate others’ voices, stealing funds and other sensitive information. Audio hijacking is a new threat, where malicious actors can manipulate large language models using voice cloning during ongoing conversations.

AI speech synthesis startup ElevenLabs has completed $80 million in Series B funding led by Andreessen Horowitz, Nat Friedman, and others. The funding will be used for product development, expanding infrastructure and teams, AI research, and enhancing security measures. ElevenLabs is valued at over $1 billion.

SAG-AFTRA, in collaboration with Replica Studios, has approved the use of AI voice actors, triggering discontent within the global voice-over community. The agreement aims to create 'fair and ethical' digital voice replicas, potentially impacting the future of human voice actors. Voice-over stars have expressed their concerns on social media, and some key figures in the voice industry have even begun to speculate about the possibility of a second actors' strike.

McAfee recently introduced a project called 'Mockingbird' aimed at addressing the issue of audio fraud using AI-generated deepfake technology. This initiative utilizes McAfee's AI deepfake audio detection technology, named 'Mockingbird', to detect deepfake technologies generated by AI that defraud consumers through audio scams and prevent false news and other fraudulent schemes. The project employs AI deepfake audio detection techniques, integrating context, behavior, and category detection models for accuracy.

The open-source voice cloning tool OpenVoice, developed in collaboration with MIT, Tsinghua University, and Canadian AI startup MyShell, has garnered attention. OpenVoice employs a simple and efficient method to almost instantly clone a user's voice, significantly reducing computational resource consumption. It boasts powerful features that provide detailed control options, including tone, emotion, rhythm, and pauses, generating personalized voice clones. MyShell's business model plans to offer monthly subscriptions through a web application, along with promotion fees for third-party bot creators and artificial intelligence services.

The Beijing Internet Court has held the first public trial of the country's first AI voice infringement case, where a voice actor sued Magic Sound Workshop APP, Microsoft, and four other defendants. The plaintiff discovered that their voice work had been transformed by AI and sold on the Magic Sound Workshop APP. The plaintiff accuses the defendants of infringing on their voice rights and demands an end to the infringement as well as compensation for losses. All five defendants deny the infringement, each claiming legal sources. The case is still under further trial.