The AI startup erasing call center worker accents | Hacker News Reader

The AI startup erasing call center worker accents

theguardian.com

15 pointsrazin13 comments

I don't care if the person on the other end of the phone has an accent. I care if we are mutually intelligible and we can get things resolved. I have had (and I'm sure some of you reading this have as well) some call center people whose English I just could not understand. I've also had some that could not understand my midwestern American accent.

I have had some call center interactions with people (obviously in a different country) that passed me around their noisy call center round-robin, only to be hung up on...multiple times. I've had some that simply didn't have the authority or the answers I was looking for. It's frustrating. It's unfortunate that this has now been associated with accents. The issue here is unit economics.

Yes, I am one of the vilified that has asked a person in a call-center to "transfer me to an American center" out of frustration. The reason is because, if I get a place in America (identified by the accent) for an American company, I know 9 times outta 10, it's gonna be a dedicated call center ONLY for that company. Otherwise, I'm dealing with a massive call-center which probably has many client companies and could give a damn if one frustrated customer of one of their many clients can't find a resolution.

Point being, aside from language issues, I don't give a damn about the accent. I care about quality of services and actually getting things resolved in a timely manner.

Also: Shout out to Apple for having some of the best customer service in the game!

So, AI-powered cultural appropriation? Literally tricking people into thinking they are dealing with someone from their culture. Ethnic fraud. But the Guardian predictably frames it as if the people being tricked are at fault, instead of the victims. That if only they were more virtuous, they wouldn't need to be tricked.

I wonder how The Guardian would react if e.g. the British were using AI when doing business in South America to trick the locals into thinking they were doing business with other locals. Would they also be accusing the locals of xenophobia?

Cultural appropriation is an odd way to frame it for anything but inducing outrage. It's definitely a bit questionable and tricking people (and making e.g. scams easier) but there's also obvious benefits beyond tricking people - e.g. making it easier to understand call workers.

To paraphrase the great cultural commentator Richard B. Riddick. "Your first mistake - you read the article".

Culture appropriation is the adoption of something from another culture. Every single culture does this. Are you Asian making pizza? That's cultural appropriation. It's not a bad thing, it's just a thing.

This also isn't ethnic fraud. That would be someone who is say, Japanese claiming to be Indian, when they are in fact fully ethnically Japanese. Not once has someone claimed an ethnicity on a support call with me. Implied? Sure. I've heard people with heavy Indian accents tell me their name was Cindy, Sarah, James, etc, but this is only by implication.

If your core concern is the outsourcing of jobs, then you can easily ask "in what country are you located?"

A counterpoint to the claims of racism: my girlfriend, who is not a native English speaker but is close to fluent, has been watching some YouTube tutorials made by an Indian woman with a strong accent. To me, the woman's accent is pleasant (I've also been watching the tutorials).

To my girlfriend, she is basically incomprehensible. She cannot follow the tutorials without subtitles and I can tell she's finding it frustrating. I can zip through them at 1.5x speed while she's struggling to even understand the tutors voice which doesn't seem fair.

So instead of labelling this as racism, perhaps we should rather be thinking about this in terms of accessibility?

I’ve read a great sci-fi short story regarding how far this could go. There is this device that alters your image to fit the “dominant culture” or the “appropriate etiquette”. You can crank it up to the point where you practically become someone else. It also feedbacks and directs your body language etc. I wish I could recall the stories name.

Previously: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32551188

> Sanas' technology is designed to revolutionize communication by giving multilingual speakers a choice when it comes to how they communicate. It's a step towards empowering individuals, advancing equality, and deepening empathy.

> We are committed to protecting the diverse voice identities of the world and their cultures.

> Our mission is to make lives better by expanding the horizons of what is possible with your voice.

Silicon Valley is becoming a parody of itself, funny to witness it from the outside. Let's see if it still exists in 2 years

Imagine publishing this article but not including an example of the technology in action...

Good film on this is "Sorry to Bother You"

Reminds me of a black mirror coming to life though.

Is there a code of ethics for programmers and engineers?

Nope, no go get your white man mask and pretend to be someone you're not, this is empowering and disruptive

Reply on news.ycombinator.com