Pushed against the wall by a technology that is gaining ground, the Union des artistes du Québec (UDA) has just joined a global coalition of voice artists, including voice actors, forming a common front with associations and unions of European and South American artists to prevent their disappearance.
This global movement aims to protect the work of recorded voice performers, whether it be dubbing or narration, two areas threatened by the prodigious advances in artificial intelligence, which makes it possible to dub actors in several languages. with their own voice, but also to generate a panoply of voices that we confuse today with those of humans.
The United Voice Artists (UVA) brings together associations and unions of recorded voice artists from some twenty countries, including France, Spain, Italy, Germany, Austria, Belgium, Switzerland and Poland, but also Turkey, the United States and countries in South America.
“The unregulated and indiscriminate use of artificial intelligence constitutes a risk that could lead to the destruction of an artistic heritage steeped in creativity and emotions, which no machine can produce,” writes the AVU in as an introduction.
In Quebec, nearly 4,000 people declare income from dubbing and narration, whether documentaries, audio books, video descriptions, video games or advertising, i.e. 44% of the 8,450 members. UDA assets.
The new president of the UDA, Tania Kontoyanni, confirmed to La Presse the adhesion of her union to the AVU almost three weeks ago.
The AVU details its concerns and makes demands in its manifesto. In particular, it is a question of preserving the intellectual property rights of authors and performers, protecting their personal data and being transparent with regard to the voices that have been generated by artificial intelligence.
But the AVU is first and foremost calling for a moratorium on the use of AI-based speech-to-text or voice-cloning tools until regulations that protect professionals from the voice is in place.
For the moment, the UDA is seeking to include at least two clauses in the agreements currently signed by the artists. The first aims to inform the artist of the presence of AI in the artistic project; the second is to ensure that the work of the artist is not used by a producer to feed an artificial intelligence, summarizes the president of the union.
“Of course it may seem like a shot in the dark, explains Tania Kontoyanni, but it’s a start. The truth is that we do not know if we will be able to stop this wave. Six months ago, AI was still an imperfect rumor, today it is mature technology. At this point, we are wondering what possible tools are available to protect our jobs. »
Meetings have already taken place with the Minister of Culture and Communications, Mathieu Lacombe, but no regulations are yet being considered by the government to force foreign producers to have their films dubbed by local voices or to prevent a company from “purchase” a Quebec synthesized voice to narrate an audio book or an advertisement…
“During this time, it is sure that things move quickly, explains Tania Kontoyanni. We have already lost the battle of video descriptions. Everything is done with AI. We lost a lot of contracts. »
Following the publication in April of a dossier by La Presse on the dazzling breakthrough of artificial intelligence in film dubbing, Minister Mathieu Lacombe admitted that “miracle solutions do not exist”, but that there are “ways to improve what we do”. “We do not claim here, in Quebec, to be able to curb a global phenomenon like this from top to bottom,” he said.
He had entrusted the Conseil de l’innovation du Québec with the responsibility of defining the guidelines for a legislative and regulatory framework for artificial intelligence in Quebec – as a whole.
Tania Kontoyanni, she has some hope in her association with the UVA, to avoid the worst, but above all not to sit idly by. “The status quo would mean that we would lose everything, she tells us, so we are working to avoid this situation, but the AI ​​is far beyond us. The question is what are we going to let the wave take away? »