A quote regarding AI by Strategic Coach Dan Sullivan from a recent email:

“AI won’t replace people. People will be replaced by other people who use AI.”

This quote gave me pause and helped me to look at this issue from a different angle. As a human voice actor, I believe the threat of AI encroaching on businesses, vocations and territory traditionally held by actual humans is real and must be taken seriously. But if you’re in an industry that AI’s digital eyes are watching hungrily (we can’t help but ascribe animalistic traits to non-living things, can we?) how can you take action with Sullivan’s wise words ringing in your head? Ringing in your head in the form of a human voice, hopefully.

For starters you can get with it. Understand it. Study it. Use it and get a feel for its reach. Whether it’s ChatGPT, synthetic voices, or transcription software. Realize its potential and learn how you can capture what it offers to your benefit. Burgle the gold from its lair. Even if that means a fuller understanding of what benefits AI brings as it relates to, in my case and the case of my fellow voice artists, voice and voiceover technologies. Try to find out where that lines leads and ends and the benefits of decidedly and exclusively human contribution begins. AI’s “emotions” are algorithmic, not intuitive, not emotional, not empathetic nor compassionate.

While AI can offer speed and efficiency that no human can match, it does not tote with it the need for compensation aside from a fee or subscription and will never call in sick or sue its employer for wrongful termination. The presence of AI should be a motivator. It should be a source of inspiration, a reminder to know yourself deeply and lean into the aspects of yourself and your human-ness that ONLY YOU can bring. It is those aspects that will set you apart not only from AI, but from everyone and everything else. That should be cause for celebration. If not, just ignore it, turn your back on it and hope for the best at your peril. Maybe it will just go away. But what do I know? I’m only human.