Spotify has invested a lot of money to provide a platform for creatives and notable personalities to express themselves with the podcasting medium, but new technology might help their talent get new listeners.
The Swedish audio-streaming company announced on September 25 that they are using artificial intelligence for a new feature that will translate podcasts into multiple audible languages. With this tool, Spotify (SPOT) -) aims to spread the reach of its popular podcasts beyond language barriers and help them find new audiences.
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This new piece of technology utilizes OpenAI’s voice transcription tool Whisper, which on its own, can transcribe English speech and translate other languages back to English. In addition to these capabilities, Spotify will not only translate a podcast into other languages, but also artificially replicate the podcaster’s own voice.
“By matching the creator’s own voice, Voice Translation gives listeners around the world the power to discover and be inspired by new podcasters in a more authentic way than ever before,” Spotify VP of Personalization Ziad Sultan said in a statement.
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Spotify is partnering with a handful of top podcasters like Dax Shepard and Monica Padman for the initial rollout of this new feature. On release, the tool will translate episodes from English to Spanish, but the audio streaming platform also has plans to translate episodes in French and German, as well as including more podcasters to be translated.
A representative from Spotify told TheStreet in a statement that the focus of the pilot project is to ensure that the program is creating high quality voice translations of its initial small group of podcasters, with the goal of bringing the technology to more podcasters around the globe in the future.
Additionally, they stated that monetization opportunities are currently not being considered in the pilot project, but such opportunities in the future will be done in partnership with creators.
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