> I almost mis-typed “in voice” as “invoice.”

> scan Amazon says 100m Alexa devices sold - usage figures “remain a mystery”

> read Fifteen Unconventional Uses of Voice Technology, from a heartbroken Google Home to talking plants. These mostly awesome super artistic and interesting projects. Maybe a great way to glimpse into the future?

> read Sacred choral music touches on deep religious, moral and political questions - Choral music in the Economist. Interesting to think about voice, music, & sound from this perspective.

> read Patreon, Kickstarter and the new patrons of the arts Once the gift of princes, patronage is now the spare change millennials pay podcasters.

> Go see Alexa, Improvise, from the improv team The Fun Room. Here’s an excerpt from Engadget review: “Shortly after 8 p.m. that Saturday night, Alex Smith, the owner of said Echo, arrived on stage and said those exact words: ‘Alexa, improvise.’ The Echo beeped, flashed a blue ring light, but failed to respond. ‘She doesn’t know how to do that,’ he laughed. ‘We’ll be doing that part.’”

> read Amazon is working on Alexa newscaster voice for reading the news

> Check out Sad Bunny a Google Voice action which is “a sniffling, sobbing Google Home…created as a digital representation of myself who you console through a recent break-up.” This is a great example of a synthetic personality, although the voice is Google Home’s, not custom. Read more about it here. This could have been in the voice section, but I’m including it the Synth section because it’s fundamentally about the personality of the “bot.” Having said that, this is precisely why voice platforms and synthetic media are related.

> Tell a friend about applying to Betaworks’ Synthetic Camp. Read about it here: Is This The Real Life? (apparently Gen-Zers don’t know that’s a Queen reference. Oh well…

> Check out AICAN, an Artificial Intelligence Artist and a Collaborative Creative Partner. “Each artwork AICAN makes is an answer to the question ‘If we teach the machine about art and styles and push it to generate novel images that do not follow established styles, what would it generate?”

> Watch this Youtube video from NVIDIA showing the first AI Rendered Virtual World. “The frames you see are not rendered by a graphics engine, it’s rendered by AI technology that we built.”:

> Read How to recognize fake AI-generated images by @kcimc

> Play BadCupid. It’s is an…Ok I don’t really know what it is let alone how to explain it. It’s a game on top of twitch where you can react with emotions to these two people talking. GamingGrandad18 may put it best in the twitch comment sidebar: “Woow there are some weird games out there.”

Have a great weekend!

— Matt Hrt.mn