skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
That King Tut image was really sensational back then, at least for early teenage me, and for a computer that was within imaginable reach (the Amiga, of course).
Didn't they also ask for permission from her two days before releasing the voice? Why ask permission if it was not her voice?
Tech has a consent problem, no doubt. The popup which won't let you decline but instead asks you again and again forever is just the lowest manifestation of a deeper issue.
It's a shame their "OpenAI" integration doesn't let you specify the Base URL and model. Then it could have worked locally with ollama (or with any other OpenAI compatible API if that matters: mistral, groq, ...)

It's a bit of a shame to see an open source product makes an "OpenAI" only integration when they could have make it work with minimal effort with the free and open alternatives (ignorance maybe). Hopefully I can contribute that.
OpenAI wanted a tone in their demo, they contacted Scarlet, and she refused.

If this is OK (and of course it is, no one has to accept any offer), how is OpenAI working with someone with a similar voice tone not OK?

If Sam used someone's voice without consent, that's illegal and immoral, but I see nothing wrong with Sam paying someone with a similar voice and using that voice instead.
> 35,000 people (over 15,000 of which are children)

For what is worth, the UN estimates are significantly lower with less than 8’000 children (and 5’000 women) out of the 25’000 identified casualties. Maybe there are indeed 10’000 additional victims as Hamas claims (the UN take that number at face value, Israel estimated are slightly lower) but it seems unlikely that 75% of them are children. It’s not physically imposible though.
> I've done tests where I text a friend using Signal and WhatsApp, E2E encrypted apps, and the default keyboard tracks every word.

Prove it. Seeing targeted ads is not proof.
> Why not?

Want to try it?

> But most people would agree that you can get an organ transplant or an artificial limb or a hearing aid or wear glasses -- or any combination of the above -- and still be you. Not so for a brain transplant.

I do not think that is relevant in any way. Most people also believe in God; that does not make it a compelling claim.
Just wanted to share the wild ride of how we built HyperClapper, our LinkedIn engagement pod that went from zero to $500 in just a week and then we fall again.
BUT WE WON 10000$ from Single client
The Crazy Idea
So, there we were, drowning in LinkedIn posts that no one cared about. Our brilliant content? Totally ignored. It was like shouting into the void. Over a few beers, my buddy and I came up with the idea of HyperClapper. We thought, "What if we had a squad to hype each other up?" And boom, HyperClapper was born.
The Hustle
We started with nothing but a dream and a really buggy platform. Seriously, it crashed more than my old college laptop. We invited everyone we knew—friends, colleagues, that random guy from the coffee shop. The first week was a mess. Late nights, caffeine overload, and more debugging than I care to remember. But hey, we started seeing some results. People’s posts were getting noticed, and that felt awesome.
The Struggles
Man, convincing people to join was like trying to sell ice to Eskimos. We sent out hundreds of messages and got ghosted a lot. And then, there were the tech issues. One night, our server just... died. We lost a bunch of users, and I seriously considered smashing my computer. But we kept going, fixing bugs, and making things better.
Building the Squad
The real magic happened when we focused on building a community. We started hosting virtual hangouts, sharing tips, and celebrating wins. There’s this one user, Sarah, who runs a small business. She told us how HyperClapper helped her posts blow up. Her success became our success, and it felt incredible.
The Breakthrough
And then it happened. In just one week, we made $500. It was insane! People were signing up, engagement was skyrocketing, and our little idea was taking off. We were ecstatic, sleep-deprived, but ecstatic.
We stuck at this MRR for few months but a Single client help us by throwing 10k$ :)
What’s Next?
HyperClapper is more than just a tool now; it’s a community of people helping each other succeed. We’re still growing, still learning, and still fixing bugs (some things never change). But seeing our users thrive makes it all worth it.
So yeah, that’s our story. If you’ve got a crazy idea, go for it. You never know what might happen. And if you’re struggling with LinkedIn, come join us at HyperClapper. We’ve got your back.
Entrepreneur Tips:
Embrace Failure: Every setback is a lesson. Learn from it, and keep pushing forward.
Build a Community: Your users are your best advocates. Engage with them, listen to their feedback, and celebrate their successes.
Stay Persistent: There will be tough days. Keep going, even when it feels impossible.
Keep Improving: Your first version won’t be perfect. Keep iterating, fixing bugs, and adding features based on feedback.
Believe in Your Vision: If you believe in your idea, others will too. Stay passionate and keep hustling.
Btw we also got ranked on product hunt as a featured product and hacker news. I am really looking forward to get going.
A longer than expected career journey
In fairness, Israel did have a point that the original judge selection process was unfair to them. Realistically though that is probably not the main reason they didn't sign it and that issue has since been rectified.
"Tactical charisma" is a good one.

Honestly though, if you actually listen to him and read his words he seems to be even more devoid of basic empathetic human traits than even Zuckerberg who gets widely lampooned as a robot or a lizard.

He is a grifter through-and-through.
This was posted up-thread, but there is a clear legal argument known as "passing off" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passing_off. It turns out your "intuition" isn't actually a basis for a legal system nor a way to position yourself as a legal scholar.
A teacher that appears to be smart as Einstein. Unless you know about the topic.
That is quite easy - you show the training data and provide the details of a person whose voice it was.

With purely synthetic voices, it’s gray area just like with most of the other genai.
No, unfortunately it's not possible to set a custom URL... OpenAI is either hard coded or using a configuration option that isn't exposed.
> the most recognisable and human-like AI voice from fiction

No, that would be either cortana or Majel Barrett Roddenberry.
Gmail pushes chrome as a default browser repeatedly too. No way to turn that off. The system knows you don't want it (having already said no 15 times) its just hoping the 16th time you will accidentally click yes. I suspect as search evolves AI will no doubt be better at sneaking in less accurate but more lucrative results.
> company’s aspiration to be good for humanity

Seems like they abandoned it pretty early - if it was real in the first place.
No. There is an interview/documentary about South Park where they talk about celebrity appearances in the show. They said that they never request celebrities to play themselves in the show. If the person declines the offer, they can get into legal trouble for imitating them. If they don't ask it is fine.

The problem here is that they wanted Scarlett Johansson and imitated her when she said no.

There is also a big market for "celebrity sound alikes" in voice acting.
She certainly does.

However, the company hiring her might not have the right to use her voice with the intent purpose of passing that voice off as that of the other person.

She is completely unfettered in any roles that do not have that intent.
Show HN: I make a new screen drawing app for Windows
It is incredibly disheartening to see celebrities from traditional media expressing open disdain for the century's most revolutionary piece of technology.

Johansson was foolish to turn this down. This all sounds like she realized the mistake, regretted it, then sent her legal team to pursue this frivolous cease and desist out of spite.

I'm disappointed that OpenAI didn't see this for what it is, and decided to comply instead.
Gentle reminder:

https://www.inc.com/kit-eaton/why-a-former-white-house-cyber...
Yes of course she does. She’s demonstrably copying a certain actress playing the role of an AI here though, but yeah this is one of the points that would have to be duked out in court. Likely as part of the “coincidence” defence.
Maybe Sama tweeted/ex-posted "her" because that was a trending topic related to the demo? I guess everything has to be some grand conspiracy nowadays.
Open source does not mean free.

Free software existed in the 90s and the most important free software ever made, the web, came out of a state funded institution.

Open source software is in a market but markets predate capitalism by thousands of years and are part of a variety or political and economic systems most notably communism (and no the USSR cannot be used as an example of communism in action, the first thing that Lenin did was dissolve the Soviets).

Finally open source is highly regulated. Try posting source code someone claims copyright on. Or is deemed illegal. There have been unregulated markets in history. Open source just isn’t one of them.
Heck, even older pre-EFI systems. You could get clues by which read SPD
They have teams maintaining/debugging/operating their use/consumption of dynamodb; they don't have teams maintaining/debugging/operating/securing dynamodb itself.

With LedgerDB, they now have to do both.
Another thought-terminating cliché.

https://bookriot.com/do-great-artists-steal/
So your response is ... "No I'm not, you are."

Well. This reaction invites further psychological interpretations, lol.
Yes/No became Yes / Please ask me later, and thank you very much (in a semi-hidden button in a totally unexpected position that doesn’t even look clickable)

And a few months later, it’ll toggle to “yes” automatically, due to a “bug”.
Because that question can be swapped for 1000s of other one-off questions I might have over time, like "use find to delete all node_modules folders below this directory" or "use jq to extract the username key from each obj in a top level array".
> outperform comparable Intel- and AMD-designed chips

sure, in some tasks

im sure the gamers will have a thing or two to say

what made the transition easier for apple was their rosetta translationlayer

i wonder if windows have similar.

If i recall, the video i saw on an arm-chip powered windows laptop from a while ago, the performance was terrible and a some software just wouldnt run
I don't condone using a replacement voice with bad intentions,And this is clearly what it is.

However!

With this mentality, the mentioned paid voice actresses voice is not hers anymore because another one's voice is similar and it's used in a movie? So she can't work and voice any other work without Scarlet Johansson's permission?
That wasn't my intention, so apologies if i've come across wrongly, I was just taken aback by the reaction. To me the situation is clear and common sense, you have a different view, which is bizarre to me, but likewise then I assume my view must be bizarre to you. We have both expressed those and it's not worth going forward and arguing over something that is fairly irrelevant to both our lives.
This isn't an artist building on the work of previous artists, this is a for-profit company repurposing people's work and mass producing it without permission or paying royalties.
If you combined this with JIT compilation and a macro system you could make a pretty nice performant browser-ready lisp that produces small code.
You are confusing ICJ & ICC. But yes, that is one of the principles of the ICC.

(ICJ = a court for countries to go to when they disagree on how to interpret a treaty. ICC = throw individual people in jail who commit war crimes, crimes against humanity or genocide)
I am all for keeping the heat on OpenAI for still calling themselves "OpenAI", when they are really closed/secretAI. I think they have a true position on secrets that they do not reveal, and that's a serious issue deserving of serious questioning--but is also a broader societal issue (corporations have legal protection on secrets. should they? I think we need to revisit that)

I think a lot of other things like this one are nits.
Sure, she has a right to use her voice. An AI reproducing her voice is not her voice, though.
Thank you for pointing this out. It worked, even on Mac.
A technical audit would clear that up.

Because the most obvious thing for OpenAI do would be training the voice on Scarlett Johansson's available body of work, from movies, audiobooks, podcasts etc. Why bother hiring a voice actor?
We have several processes which involve the upload of multiple different images, which the user is walked through with baby steps, I.e. 'take this exact picture of the asset' -> take the next, etc. Etc.

We're currently working on an image classification model to automatically tag these images with what they are and just providing a visual sample gallery of 'take these pictures' with the sample image border turning green when that type of image is identified. We expect this will reduce a multi-step error prone process with a more streamline experience.
> However, the company hiring her might not have the right to use her voice with the intent purpose of passing that voice off as that of the other person.

Please cite statute.

Generally speaking malicious intent only does not an illegal act make. Last I checked a voice is rightly not a trademarkable thing (it's a quality, not a definable entity).
You can just not turn it on. This is the most mild AI integration of any recent terminal I’ve seen. Also you can set the url from what other commenters are saying so you can use a local LLM if you want.

This manufactured outrage is absurd. iTerm2 has been the most solid and conservative terminal I’ve ever used and people are pretending they jumped the shark with this feature.
It would depend on whether she got the job for having a good voice or for having a voice that is associated with a famous person. Would her voice have the same value if it was not sounding like another famous person's voice? That's up to the courts to decide.
Show HN: Oracolo – A minimalist Nostr blog in a single HTML file
Oracolo is a minimalist blog powered by Nostr, that consists of a single html file, weighing only ~140Kb. It works also without a web server; for example you can send it via email as a business card.

Take it as a didactic experiment, it's no production ready, indeed it has some limitations (no SEO friendly structure), but can work as a temporary solution (e.g. coming soon and parking pages), and it is still an example of how easy it is to create a Nostr-powered web app and deploy it on a low-tech infrastructure.

Comments and suggestions on how to improve it are welcome!
I didn't say as smart as "adult Einstein" ;)
I tried to solve Flatland Space Stations: https://www.hackerrank.com/challenges/flatland-space-station... on HackerRank lately in Python, but I had to switch to Golang because I could not make the cases with large input sizes (O(very large)) pass. I am relaying the challenge here, and wondering if folks on hackernews can crack a solution in Python.
I’m sure “Majel” is in the pipeline.

Would the everywoman on the street be able to recognise Majel over Scarlett? I don’t believe so.
I made a list of and250 companies hiring developers in the US
If it might be of any help: I made a list of +250 companies recruiting developers in the United States (front, back, full stack, ...): you can find the list here (created the 14th of May 24)

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1MtmpkY3LnBEyURrYXehJYVBTHwmA8HZZjKLNBHNgeCo/edit?ref=en.blog.mantiks.io#gid=405908756

I remove all the recruiting agencies and intern position to have the cleanest list possible :)
I basically scrape job postings from Indeed, LinkedIn, Glassdoor, ...

There is a lot more actually: around +2k companies hiring developers in the US in the last 30 days or so.

I've written an article on how to do such job extraction, if anyone is interested: How to find companies hiring developers - https://en.blog.mantiks.io/find-companies-recruiting-developers/
I don't know.

But quite a lot of people understand the difference, at a visceral level, between a painting made by an individual amateur artist and a painting made for selling at one of those Fine Art chains, or the difference between something rough and charming and a painting you might have seen in the 90s while trying to locate the loo in a UK branch of McDonalds.

People's instinctive artistic "literacy" is often surprising.
Issue is that they asked Scarlett beforehand and even CEO advertised it based on the fame of Scarlett.
It is not about the possible voice actress anymore.
It was all about Scarlett, not about the voice actress. The voice actress is just an excuse at this point.

If they would have never mentioned Scarlett or asked her, it might be different situation.
Are LLMs basically ‘pirating humanity’ at this point?

The unauthorized use or reproduction of humanity's work.
But the clone of her voice IS being used to fraudulently imply that she's involved.

https://x.com/sama/status/1790075827666796666?lang=en

"her" -Sam Altman
Intent matters. There's enough evidence out there pointing out to OpenAI's intention to copy Scarlett Johansson's character in "Her". The voice actress could read literally the same lines with the same intonation for (say) Facebook and, as long as she wasn't coached to sound like Scarlett Johansson, it would be fine.
Can you provide the evidence indicating that her voice was stolen? Maybe also an audio analysis of the vocal characteristics involved and the degree of similarity? And wouldn't it be prudent to investigate these matters before making such accusations?
Step 1: clone the Scarlet Johanson's voice

Step 2: use control vectors to make it slightly different
That is a dumb low effort take that doesn't even try to refute the statement that this is amazing technology, which it very clearly is.

He said "amazing technology" not "AGI that can replace humans". They are not the same.
I hate being the product for ad-targeting for visceral reasons, but it's benign compared to my days falling into the hands of someone who wishes me harm.

There are other companies that I work harder to keep my metrics away from than from MS. MS at least makes money from things other than ads.

But I don't trust Microsoft to secure that data. If Google did this product, I would have lower expectation of my screen recordings ending up on the dark web.
Dubai unlocked leaks: Inside the secret billionaire hideaways
Hello there, Hackers!

I'm excited to share with you a project that came to life during my journey into SwiftUI: Binsoo. With five years of experience as a React Native Developer, last July presented me with a crossroads. Embracing unemployment as an opportunity, I plunged into the captivating realm of SwiftUI.
I'm hoping to receive feedback and reviews from all of you so that I can continue to maintain and further develop the project.

Link Download: https://apps.apple.com/vn/app/binsoo-photo-editor/id65026837...
There was an image-editor I used to use and it was a joy. IrfanView, I think, it was!

I would like to have that back if I could!
They refused to provide documentation of how the voice was trained.
To avoid negative PR and legal risk stemming from confusion
Population density of whole region isn't as relevant as you think. The most relevant are metropolitan areas and areas of high traffic corridors. That is where trains and mass transit make the most sense.
Generally I view things like this as under-investment in energy provision, rather than 'overusage' by businesses.

There was story last year in the UK, where the power usage of data centres in west London were blamed for a lack of housing development. This turned out not to be true and an exercise in blame-shifting [1]

[1] https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252523510/Datacentre-sec...
> because once you decide somebody is stupid

You just have made up an argument. There is no stated nor implied stupidity.

You can't dismiss critique of carelessness like that.
Ukraine Has First Navy Drone Armed with Anti-Aircraft Missiles
Are you joking? Just don’t put in an API key and it will never do anything AI related.

People getting all up in arms over an optional feature…
Maybe because you still have to annotate the parts where she speaks.
> If it was an exact copy fine, but it's not.

This is not the point, as stated by Ms Johansson's statement, her own friends could not tell the difference which is the point. If a reasonable person cannot tell the difference, there is none. In combination with seeking a prior agreement to use her voice this sounds quite dubious at best, malicious at worst.
Much like with the whole "web3" crypto craze before it, I think it behooves us to push back pretty loudly on everyone who buys into the grift-of-the-week.

Nobody actually believes OpenAI is giving away billions of dollars in free compute just so we don't have to memorize awk syntax...
Yeah but it’s not just intent, they released a product after the intent.
Just noticed that yesterday. Almost made me give up on logging in and posting. The day old reddit is gone will probably be the day I can't tolerate it any longer.
Well, it's not free. You have to provide an API key to iTerm.
> it also points to a wider problem

Look at the comments, even in this thread, defending Sam. I thought this could be dealt with by the courts. But it clearly needs stronger medicine; there is simply too much hubris. Congress may need to act; let’s start with states’ AGs. (Narrow clarifications on copyright and likeness rights, to start. Prosecution from there. The low-hanging fruit is anyone in Illinois who was enrolled in WorldCoin.)

We, as a community, have been critical of crypto. AI is different—Altman is not. He is a proven liar, and this episode demonstrates the culture he has created at a multibillion-dollar firm that seems destined, in the long run, for—at best—novel conservatorship.

We have a wider problem. It isn’t “alignment.” It’s 19th-century fast-talking fraudsters clothing themselves in the turtlenecks of dead founders.
That was insane, e.g. ".NET Messenger" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Messenger_service which was just MSN messenger, had nothing to do with .NET as in C#.

Then there was the "Skype" and "Skype for Business" naming debacle.
They underestimated how quickly people would take off the headphones and jump on the bandwagon to claim affinity with an injured celebrity.

Are you suggesting they should have engineered the voice actress' voice to be more distinct from another actress they were considering for the part? Or just not gone near it with a 10ft pole? because if the latter the studios can just release a new Her and Him movie with different voices in different geo regions and prevent anyone from having any kind of familiar engaging voice bot.
What we learned from Snowflake Copilot the most powerful SQL LLM in the world
I’m sick to death of hearing this. It’s the antithesis of a substantive argument, in a topic where there’s no shortage of substantive points to be made. Why are we still trotting it out on HN. Arguing about the name basically amounts to “I believe that when you use the word ‘open’ in your company name, they should act like $this”…which is, frankly, absurd. If you want to talk about how they’ve gone back on their word or whatever, can we just stick to that? Getting one’s knickers in a twist over “open” in the name just dumbs down the conversation and gets everyone arguing about semantics.
You’re assuming that the VA’s voice (assuming there even was one) was their natural voice, rather than an acted one.