A Sydney radio station has been using an AI-generated host for about six months without disclosing it – and was not legally obliged to.
It was revealed last week that Australian Radio Network’s (ARN) Sydney-based CADA station, which broadcasts across western Sydney and is available online and through the iHeartRadio app, had created and deployed an AI host for its Workdays with Thy slot.
The artificial host known as “Thy” is on-air at 11am each weekday to present four hours of hip-hop, but at no point during the show, nor anywhere on the ARN website, is the use of AI disclosed.
After initial questioning from Stephanie Coombes in The Carpet newsletter, it was revealed that the station used ElevenLabs – a generative AI audio platform that transforms text into speech – to create Thy, whose likeness and voice were cloned from a real employee in the ARN finance team.
An ARN spokesperson said the company was exploring how new technology could enhance the listener experience.
have they tried having nothing instead
Any samples?
When train station announcements got automated, nobody batted an eye.
When a radio station’s in-between-tracks filler talk gets automated… I couldn’t care less.
I’d say this is a valid use for AI, they could even automate generating the filler talk scripts.
But do people like “her” content? Like, I’ll be honest, radio mid day to me is very much a “spin some hits and good jams and don’t talk over everything or interrupt” kind of thing. I don’t want a DJ talking over or between tracks other than the occasional mention of what the song was. A number of stations I’ve frequented in the past were literally just a DJ’s playlist with ads interjecting every so often.
I don’t want a DJ talking over or between tracks other than the occasional mention of what the song was.
Most egregious instance of this I ever heard was the dude that talked over the ENTIRE FUCKING RUNTIME OF FOREPLAY. He finally shut up when Long Time started, but God damn, he talked right over the best part.
Straight up excellent 8 minutes of Boston, DJ was a fucknut
So … six months and nobody notices?
What’s the problem?
That just means nobody listens to what radio DJs have to say. Or to the radio, for that matter.
The problem is that the radio station thinks listeners seem to need some human voice to tell them things in between songs but they don’t want to pay an actual human to do it so they burn trees instead. Just put on a playlist at that point and leave more room for another song or two.
I think a lot of the job is a hold over from a pre Internet era. Yes, stations do you have to regularly state what channel you’re listening to, but before the Internet DJs provided pretty useful information regarding what was playing. You couldn’t just look up on the fly the lyrics of a song to find out the name or the band, or if they were playing in your area.
DJs used to give listeners that information, and potentially provide additional context or similar bands that would be of interest. It was hard to get that information at the time. I know some relatively young people who still listen to DJ morning shows, but they listen for the skits And humor, not for the music insights. At this point, I don’t think there’s really much need for them, but I imagine nobody wants to be the first to fully get rid of them. I imagine people are upset about this, but I don’t know that they would be any less upset if they just decided to do away with DJs altogether.
Not just about the music, either. You’d also get local traffic and weather occasionally, and if there was some important news to report on, that would take precedence.
You don’t get that with the streaming service of your choosing.
Very true. I remember people listening to a local station not because of their music, but they had the best traffic coverage. It was the generic top billboard songs station, so maybe that skewed perception, but plenty of people only tuned in on their way to work for the traffic and would listen to other stations if given the option otherwise. I totally forgot about that.
I suppose mapping applications provide pretty good traffic for literally where you are driving, so there’s that. Weather is on there, too, if you want it.
It’s the “sudden important news story” bit that isn’t covered yet, I think.
The classic conflict of automation. Due to the structure of our economic system, the benefits of reducing labor are not that we all have more time to pursue art, philosophy, joy or love- instead talented, interesting people are forced out of jobs they can do well (and enjoy) and into financial stress and confusion.
