| Last year, Amazon.com Inc. announced that self-published authors in the US who make their books available on the Kindle Store would soon be able to access a new tool in beta testing. Many of them, likely prohibited by cost and time, hadn't yet turned their ebooks into audiobooks, but with the help of an Artificial Intelligence-generated "virtual voice" they could easily do so. In the months since the free tool launched in beta, authors have embraced it. Over 40,000 books in Audible are marked as having been created with it, and, in posts online, authors praise the fact that they have saved hundreds or thousands of dollars per title on narration costs. One author, Hassan Osman of the Writer on the Side blog said turning one of his books into an audiobook took only 52 minutes. But while authors might appreciate unlocking a potential revenue stream, audiobook listeners have separately complained online about the influx of new material. Books voiced with the AI are marked clearly as such, but listeners' primary complaint is that they can't filter these voices out. "During the beta we are learning more about what our customers want as we continue to innovate on their behalf," said an Audible spokesperson over email. These AI-voiced titles have an "average overall rating of 4+," the spokesperson said. Still, some consumers worry this development portends a tough future for narrators who will lose work while listeners suffer from lagging quality. "So depressing to discover Virtual Voice narrations of audiobooks on Audible," posted one X user. "Yes, they are good enough. Alas." And while authors' counterparts in the music business have actively fought against the introduction of AI into their industry and sought safeguards against it, audiobook narrators appear to be facing the threat of the technology without much recourse. One narrator, Ramon de Ocampo, responded to someone on X about the test, saying virtual voices had "not taken all the jobs. But it's trying to." HarperCollins already announced its partnership with ElevenLabs to voice books in different languages. (One detail to note: Audible doesn't accept AI-narrated audiobooks other than those created with virtual voice or with explicit approval.) In conversations I've had with publishing industry executives, most say they're treading lightly into the AI realm. They tend to agree that using the technology for translated books makes sense, but they seem less convinced, at least outwardly, that completely AI-narrated audiobooks will be the future. Personally, I just listened to Jennette McCurdy's I'm Glad My Mom Died, a book McCurdy brings to life with impressions of family members. She does an amazing job, and I struggle to imagine the book being nearly as good without her touch. Granted, she's an actress, and this was her memoir, which makes her a uniquely qualified narrator. Still, Audible and Amazon's rollout gets at the developing tension between publishers, authors and consumers. For authors who can't afford to produce their own audiobooks, it's easy to understand why virtual voices appeal to them. But for listeners who want options, or at least the ability to support only human-created works, the filtering and labeling systems have to improve. | 
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