Using AI for reading

[odamizu]

Originally Posted by arjaybe

Isn't text-to-speech these days using AI to read?

I've been impressed with ElevenReader, which uses AI for text-to-speech. Their voice quality is impressive and their pricing works for me. I used to use Voice Dream, but their voices are really robotic, even the ones that are supposedly AI.

Of course, if there's a human-narrated audiobook, I always go for that first. But every now and then there's something I want to read with my ears that doesn't have an audiobook. Then I use TTS.

[rantanplan]

Originally Posted by arjaybe

Isn't text-to-speech these days using AI to read?

It depends on what you mean by AI in this context. DeepL is an LLM. And apparently, it's outperforming everything that openAI has ever created.

Text-to-speech does not require an LLM.

[Graham44]

Originally Posted by jhowell

Yes, at least for books that are part of a series. There is no way to opt out of it.

Wow that is certainly something, the paranoid among us might think that's a great way for Amazon to teach their AI/ steal otherwise copyrighted work, but that's just being paranoid

[arjaybe]

Originally Posted by odamizu

I've been impressed with ElevenReader, which uses AI for text-to-speech. Their voice quality is impressive and their pricing works for me. I used to use Voice Dream, but their voices are really robotic, even the ones that are supposedly AI.

Of course, if there's a human-narrated audiobook, I always go for that first. But every now and then there's something I want to read with my ears that doesn't have an audiobook. Then I use TTS.

So, I guess it's a good idea that I make a note that my audiobooks are read by a human?

[odamizu]

Originally Posted by arjaybe

So, I guess it's a good idea that I make a note that my audiobooks are read by a human?

Oh, I wasn't referring to published/commercial audiobooks created with AI (i.e., Audible's "Virtual Voice" or OverDrive's "Synthesized Voice"). I guess if the author has chosen an AI narrator and I really wanted to support the author (e.g., maybe they're a new or indie author and couldn't afford a human narrator), I guess I would listen to it.

But what I was referring to are books or documents that don't have an audiobook at all. In that case, the only way to listen to it is by using Text-to-Speech, and some of the AI-powered TTS apps are impressive, sounding almost human.

[leebase]

I love and use AI all day. I’m not sure I would trust it to not give spoilers, even when directed. We have family book club, just last week my daughter had a book spoiled by ChatGPT spoiler. She was asking for chapter summaries for our book talk. Turns out the spoiler was a hallucination lol!

Now, if I fed the book content to the AI myself, then I’d be happy to use it as his do.

I chat with the AI a lot when reading my Bible. It’s added considerable value to the experience.

[leebase]

Originally Posted by Deskisamess

Too many people are totally unaware of the true cost of AI. Bringing that info into every conversation about it is not a bad thing. At the very least it may cause the uninformed to do some of their own research about it.

Yes, it is a bad thing. If someone doesn’t like a topic, don’t participate.

[leebase]

Originally Posted by John F

I'm with DiapDealer on this. Start another comprehensive thread on the evils of AI and let the people who are interested read it. Once a thread has started to Peter out, then reference the thread.

Otherwise, they are just more drive by opinions like:Google is evil, Apple is evil, COLOR is bad, everyone must use a cover, Kindle bad - Kobo good, ...

You forgot “reading on lcd doesn’t kill your eyes”. 👀

[leebase]

Originally Posted by odamizu

I've been impressed with ElevenReader, which uses AI for text-to-speech. Their voice quality is impressive and their pricing works for me. I used to use Voice Dream, but their voices are really robotic, even the ones that are supposedly AI.

Of course, if there's a human-narrated audiobook, I always go for that first. But every now and then there's something I want to read with my ears that doesn't have an audiobook. Then I use TTS.

I haven’t tried this yet. Thanks for the idea

[DrNefario]

I don't feel I'd be able to trust an AI summary, given the nonsense I get on my google searches. Yesterday I was trying to found out if a book was in a particular subgenre. I felt it was borderline, but the subgenre itself is kind of woolly. Gemini said it was, but no actual search result seemed to agree.

[kovidgoyal]

Originally Posted by arjaybe

Isn't text-to-speech these days using AI to read?

As somebody that has implemented a TTS system in the calibre reader, no it isnt. What happens is the text is converted to phonemes based on the language the text is in. Training data is thus a sequence of phonemes along with the waveform they generate. When you send text to the model to convert to speech that text also gets converted to phonemes before being fed to the model.

As an aside, these TTS models run on exactly the same architecture as LLMs. Indeed LLMs dont care that they are being fed tet or phonemes or pixel data or whatever, it's all just treated as sequences of bytes.

[Deskisamess]

Originally Posted by leebase

Yes, it is a bad thing. If someone doesn’t like a topic, don’t participate.

Well, that's very black & white. It would sure reduce conversations here.

[DiapDealer]

Even I would not want this (or any) conversation limited to those who "liked" the topic. I only wish participants would a) engage the OP on their terms (as specified by questions asked in the original post); and b) not try to shout over the conversation with already well-established positions in an attempt to quash all conversation that doesn't align with those well-established positions.

I don't particularly care for the dead-horse-flogging approach (or pet-topic-grievance approach) to "conversation."

I do publicly apologize to Quoth if my posts offended or hurt. But I sometimes wonder if you even realize just how much you try to dominate/steer all conversation about AI here on MR. AI (and all of its adopted--albeit semantically incorrect--terminology) is here to stay. Nothing is going to change that. Sometimes people are going to want to talk about it without being proselytized to about it.

[leebase]

Originally Posted by Barty

One good use I've found for ChatGPT is to ask it to summarize the first n chapter of _____, no spoilers going forward. Or I'll come across a character and ask is this character new or did they appear previously and I forgot. Etc

Anyone using AI to help/enhance their reading?

And not JUST to summarize the book chapters - but have conversations about the ideas or themes in the book. I do the same when listening to music. Have a chat about the band, the album - etc. it’s a blast.

Fun conversation snippet today

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by leebase

And not JUST to summarize the book chapters - but have conversations about the ideas or themes in the book. I do the same when listening to music. Have a chat about the band, the album - etc. it’s a blast.

Thanks, but no. I absolutely DO NOT want to discuss the books I read, the movies I watch or the music I listen to with anyone/anything, be it AI or human. For me, media consuming is a strictly solitary activity. No chatting, no discussing. I'm not interested in anyone else's opinions about the media I consume; that's why I seldom read reviews and almost never discuss books/movies/music. Perish the thought.