We’re used to hearing Text To Speech in conversational AI, but that’s not the only option available. Voice assistants don’t have to use synthetic speech - they can use recordings of a live voice talent instead.

Andrew Muir, Lead Dialogue Designer at PolyAI, explains the benefits of using voice talents. One of his points really resonated with me - why voice talents ease users into the experience!

00:00 Start

00:24 Tell me about yourself?

02:38 What's your favourite bot?

03:26 What are your biggest concerns about ChatGPT?

05:58 What journalistic skills do you use in conversation design?

08:42 Why do you choose to use voice talent at PolyAI?

13:10 So voice talent eases users into the experience?

13:52 Where would you choose to use synthetic voices?

15:56 Are you using voice talents and cloned voices?

17:03 Please tell me about your relationship with the voice talents?

19:14 Do you give the voice talent freedom to create their work?

19:50 Do voice talents push back against being used in AI projects?

21:36 Voice talents could get left behind by synthetic voices

22:46 Are voice talents proactively cloning their voices?

23:21 How do you approach updates to avoid spiralling costs?

26:24 Do you adjust the design based on a voice actor's performance?

30:40 Is a synthetic assistant with an empathetic voice a design sweet-spot?

31:51 Do you think there's scope for non-human character design?

36:38 The way words are said matters

38:56 The user observes everything about the bot

41:16 How do you approach voice localisation at PolyAI?

45:44 Personas are received differently in different locales

46:43 You have to know the culture intimately to localise

48:47 We have to expect we will keep updating our work

50:35 Where can people find out more about you?

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