JANUARY 2023 News Roundup
This month, it was hard to avoid the Apple Books announcement of its new AI-powered digital narration offering. A few articles are included here to represent a variety of opinions and predictions as well as AI advancements in South Korea. The glories of audiobooks as we know them are also celebrated this month with a New Yorker article, trainer’s tips, a heart-warming story of audiobooks helping Ukrainian refugee children, the surge of Spanish language audiobooks, and a case for Urdu language audiobooks.
How a Great Audiobook Narrator Finds Her Voices
Robin Miles was looking for stage and screen roles when she began reading books for the blind. She’s become one of the country’s most celebrated narrators. [Source: newyorker.com]
Audiobooks are glorious
Chief among the pleasures of being read to, is how they engage the brain through the ear and not the eye. [Source: bostonglobe.com]
Trainer's tips: Audiobooks can help you lose weight
Walking can be more enjoyable when combined with listening to audiobooks and podcasts and an affordable way for everyone to lose weight. [Source: med.news.am]
Apple Books quietly launches AI-narrated audiobooks
Apple describes the new “digital narration” feature on its website as making “the creation of audiobooks more accessible to all". [Source: theverge.com]
Do Androids Tell Electric Stories?
At the heart of what the AI voice developers are creating is something stubbornly human: real people’s voices, with all the complexity and feeling they contain. [Source: slate.com]
AI-narrated audiobooks: good or bad?
The lower bar to entry means that creating audiobooks is suddenly open to a lot more authors but when you have great writing and talented narration, you’re coming up with something special. That’s worth investing in. [Source: standard.co.uk]
BEYOND THE U.S.A.
personalized Audiobooks connect Ukrainian children with their fathers back home
Ukrainian children who fled the war with their families for the Netherlands are getting a crucial emotional lifeline: audiobooks read by their fathers who had to stay behind in Ukraine to remain ready to fight. [Source: youtube.com]
Sonic Boom: Spanish-Language Audiobooks Are Soaring
One result of the clamorous competition has been—and has driven—a burgeoning catalogue of Spanish-language audiobook content. [Source: publishingperspectives.com]
The lack of audibooks in Urdu and decline of reading
There is no shortage of voice talent in Pakistan. Imagine if they could be engaged in reading good quality audiobooks in Urdu, how much entertaining and informative content could be generated. [Source: tribune.com.pk]
Xinapse, a Korean AI Startup, Scaling AI Solutions in the Global Market
Customers can create a completely new and never-existed voice by adjusting various voice characteristic factors or synthesizing the voices of several people into one. [Source: finance.yahoo.com]