“But . . . now now?”
He shrugged.
“You’ve been saying no for years.”
“That’s before I got old.”
“Stop it.”
“I can’t even change an ink cartridge anymore.”
Sewanee snorted and stepped forward, taking over the printer. Mark dropped into his chair and sighed. “I’m tired, Swan.”
“You know you never sleep well this time of year.” His partner, Julio, had died on Leap Day fifteen years ago after losing a brutal battle with esophageal cancer. Early March was never good for Mark.
He sighed again. “This is different.”
Sewanee stole a glance at him. “You want to retire?”
He didn’t look at her. “Doug Carrey would pay a lot for this house.”
Sewanee took longer to change the cartridge than necessary, buying herself a moment to think. “And what about the studio?”
Mark sat in thoughtful silence, then abruptly leaned forward and began typing. “I want to show you something.” He hunted around, clicking the mouse, scrutinizing the screen the way he always did, as if it were the first time he’d seen a computer.
Sewanee snapped the printer back into place, put the old cartridge in a bag for recycling, and came around the desk to peer over his shoulder.
Eventually, he found what he was hunting for. A web page featuring the cover of a book. Under the image, he clicked a play button and a strong male voice came through the speakers. Sewanee listened for about a minute until Mark stopped it. “What do you think?”
She straightened. “He’s good. A bit generic, maybe. But good tone, good cadence. It’s a pretty straight nonfiction read. The end of his phrasing needs some work, but sure.” Mark was staring at her. “What?”
“Kid. There is no him.” He pointed at the text below the book cover. “That’s a real book, a real publisher. And a bot narrating.”
Sewanee stared at the screen.
This was the monster under the bed.
“Is he . . .” she corrected herself, “it . . . manufactured from a real voice, or a combination of voices, or . . . is it entirely synthesized, or–”
“Does it matter?”
No. No, it didn’t. Except:
“Well, they can’t just copy our voices, right? Without our consent. That would be illegal.”
“Would it?”
Sewanee flung a hand at the monitor. “To create AI that sounded exactly like you or me? Of course! It has to be illegal.”
Mark scoffed. “You better be saving that June French money, because that’s an expensive lawsuit, getting a court to determine what defines a voice. Whether it’s even proprietary. People do impressions.” Sewanee pushed away from the desk, feeling trapped. “And then once a court does decide,” Mark continued, blithely, “from that point forward they’ll just toe right up to whatever line was decided and be forever in the clear.”
Sewanee held up a hand. “It can’t act, though.” She hesitated. “Can it?”
“Give it time.”
“Accents? Characters?”
“What’s stopping it? Look, it’s coming for me first. Nonfiction will be the first to go.”
She was shaking her head, barely listening. “People won’t want this. People want people, the human connection, authentic storytelling.”
“Do they? I think we do, because we care about the difference. Hell, we know the difference. But the five-year-old who already lives in their iPad or Game Boy or whatnot?” He waved a hand. “What the hell do I know about this? I felt old back when this industry moved from tape to digital. All I know for sure is I’m officially a dinosaur now and this is my meteor. So”–he leaned back and crossed his hands over his stomach–“I’m gonna go buy me a swimsuit, a very small one, and I’m gonna find a beach where the only decision I have to make is what my next cocktail’s gonna be. You get to figure out this problem. But I’ll save you a lounger.”
Sewanee’s breaths were growing shallow. Mark studied her. “Hon. It’s not like we didn’t know this was coming. It was just more philosophical than practical. Not anymore.”
When she’d first met Mark, first started in this business, they’d talked all the time about Sewanee taking it over when he was ready to retire. That’s why she’d moved into the guesthouse, started working for him. It was an apprenticeship. But in the last year or two, talk of the future had drifted out of their conversations. While it was true the handwriting had been on the wall, as she cleaned everything else in the studio, she’d kept cleaning that off, too.