LOS ANGELES — The estate of George Carlin is suing the media company behind a fake hourlong comedy special that purportedly uses artificial intelligence to recreate the late standup comic’s style and material.
The lawsuit filed in federal court in Los Angeles on Thursday asks that a judge order the podcast outlet Dudesy to immediately take down the audio special, “George Carlin: I’m Glad I’m Dead,” in which a synthesis of Carlin delivers commentary on current events. Carlin died in 2008.
Carlin’s daughter, Kelly Carlin, said in a statement that the work is “a poorly-executed facsimile cobbled together by unscrupulous individuals to capitalize on the extraordinary goodwill my father established with his adoring fanbase.”
The Carlin estate and its executor, Jerold Hamza, are named as plaintiffs in the suit, which alleges violations of Carlin’s right of publicity and copyright. The named defendants are Dudesy and podcast hosts Will Sasso and Chad Kultgen.
“None of the Defendants had permission to use Carlin’s likeness for the AI-generated ‘George Carlin Special,’ nor did they have a license to use any of the late comedian’s copyrighted materials,” the lawsuit says.
The defendants have not filed a response to the lawsuit and it was not clear whether they have retained an attorney. They could not immediately be reached for comment.
At the beginning of the special posted on YouTube on Jan. 9, a voiceover identifying itself as the AI engine used by Dudesy says it listened to the comic’s 50 years of material and “did my best to imitate his voice, cadence and attitude as well as the subject matter I think would have interested him today.”
The plaintiffs say if that was in fact how it was created — and some listeners have doubted its stated origins — it means Carlin’s copyright was violated.
The company, as it often does on similar projects, also released a podcast episode with Sasso and Kultgen introducing and commenting on the mock Carlin.
“What we just listened to, was that passable?” Kultgen says in a section of the episode cited in the lawsuit.
“Yeah, that sounded exactly like George Carlin,” Sasso responds.
The lawsuit is among the first in what is likely to be an increasing number of major legal moves made to fight the regenerated use of celebrity images and likenesses.
The AI issue was a major sticking point in the resolution of last year’s Hollywood writers and actors strikes.
Josh Schiller, an attorney for the plaintiffs, said in a statement that the “case is not just about AI, it’s about the humans that use AI to violate the law, infringe on intellectual property rights, and flout common decency.”
洛杉矶 — 乔治·卡林的遗产管理人正在起诉一家媒体公司，该公司制作了一部据称利用人工智能重现已故单口喜剧演员风格和素材的虚假一小时喜剧特辑。
这项于周四在洛杉矶联邦法院提起的诉讼请求法官命令播客平台Dudesy立即撤下这部音频特辑，“乔治·卡林：我很高兴我死了”，其中一个合成的卡林对当前事件进行评论。卡林于2008年去世。
卡林的女儿，凯莉·卡林在一份声明中说，这项工作是“由不择手段的个人拼凑起来的拙劣仿制品，目的是利用我父亲与他崇拜的粉丝群建立起来的非凡善意。”
卡林的遗产及其执行人杰罗德·哈姆扎在诉讼中被列为原告，指控侵犯了卡林的名誉权和版权。被告是Dudesy和播客主持人威尔·萨索和查德·库尔特根。
诉讼称：“被告没有获得使用卡林形象制作AI生成的‘乔治·卡林特辑’的许可，也没有获得使用已故喜剧演员任何受版权保护的材料的许可。”
被告尚未对诉讼作出回应，目前尚不清楚他们是否已聘请律师。他们无法立即置评。
特辑于1月9日在YouTube上发布的开头，一段自称是Dudesy使用的AI引擎的旁白表示，它听了喜剧演员50年的材料，并“尽我所能模仿他的声音、语调和态度，以及我认为今天会引起他兴趣的主题。”
原告方称，如果事实确实如此创造的话 — 一些听众对其声称的起源表示怀疑 — 这意味着侵犯了卡林的版权。
该公司通常在类似项目上也会发布一期播客节目，由萨索和库尔特根介绍并评论这个假冒的卡林。
“我们刚才听到的，合格吗？”诉讼中引用了节目中库尔特根的一段话。
“是的，那听起来完全像乔治·卡林，”萨索回应道。
这项诉讼是可能日益增多的主要法律行动中的先驱之一，这些行动旨在打击对名人形象和肖像的再生使用。
AI问题是去年好莱坞作家和演员罢工解决方案的一个主要难点。
原告律师乔希·席勒在一份声明中表示，“这个案件不仅仅关于AI，它还关于使用AI违反法律、侵犯知识产权，并无视常识的人类。”
原创文章，作者：Xaiat
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