5 ms·

I don't have any answers to give you, but I want to say that this is a really loving and beautiful thing you're trying to do.

Someone 6y ago
Is it? My first thought was “is your ideal also her ideal?”. We cannot rule out she wants to spend quality time with her partner instead of spending time in a recording studio, so that, if the worst outcome comes, her husband can remind her of what she lost.
- kerkeslager 6y ago
  Presumably the guy is better at guessing what his wife wants than you are, and his wife is an adult who can tell him if he guesses wrong.
  - thaumasiotes 6y ago
    > his wife is an adult who can tell him if he guesses wrong She can, but she might not. A lot of that depends on how he presents the idea to her -- it might seem like something that's important to him.
    - pugworthy 6y ago
      It's sad that people trying to discuss the emotional side of this are being down voted. Honestly there is no doubt a very large emotional/personal side of this, irrespective of who's idea it is and who supports it. Technology isn't the solution for all problems and challenges in life.
      - at_a_remove 6y ago
        No, it isn't. But good lord, sometimes trying to get technical help on the Internet turns into this rabbithole of people who are specifically looking for ways not to be helpful. "Did you really want that?" "Did you consider alternatives?" "What you really have is an XY problem."
        pugworthy 6y ago
        "Truly identifying a problem means looking deeper at the symptoms, the customer, the impact, the alternatives, the opportunity, and the relationships between them, while avoiding the “solution bias” (often known as “The issue is that the customer does not use my solution”)." #1 item from https://www.molfar.io/blog/yc-questions https://www.molfar.io/blog/yc-questions
        at_a_remove 6y ago
        Or not. Not everything has to be this super-deep, six whys exploration of how craving and attachment is the cause of all suffering and if you would only stop wanting a solution you would no longer be in pain. Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.
        pugworthy 6y ago
        If it was a cigar he’d just ask the technical question of how to capture and simulate someone’s voice.
        at_a_remove 6y ago
        "I'd like to prepare, just in case, to have technology to reproduce her voice from keyboard or other input." He then goes on to say "My ideal would be an open source 'deepfake toolkit' that allows me to provide pre-recorded samples of her speech and then TTS in her voice." That sounds like wanting to capture and simulate someone's voice.
      - kerkeslager 6y ago
        People are being downvoted because if you cannot possibly have an informed opinion on a subject, it's completely arrogant to form opinions on that subject, and even more arrogant to criticize someone publicly based on those opinions. Literally the only person on this thread who knows anything about the OP's wife is the OP. Everyone else sharing an opinion on "the emotional side of this" is vocally ignorant.
  - fragmede 6y ago
    Presumably the wife is the best at knowing what she wants. I'd make no presumption, good or bad, about the their relationship dynamic, however.
- DaniloDias 6y ago
  By all means, let’s have hacker news expand this technical question into an evaluation of this guys marriage.
  - pezo1919 6y ago
    Life is complex bro.
    - kerkeslager 6y ago
      True, but I don't think it's particularly useful to get so caught up in all the possible ways that your kindly-intentioned actions could go wrong that you need permission to even try to do kind things. That's just a form of social anxiety. And it's particularly useless when your worries are about a situation which does not concern you and which you are almost completely ignorant about.
- daveFNbuck 6y ago
  I think the idea here is that she could use her own voice instead of a generic voice with text to speech devices. I doubt he intends to taunt her with it.
- glonq 6y ago
  That was also my first thought, having seen far too many tech geeks inflict unwanted products and projects onto their poor partners and families. The sentiment is admirable, but it's a lot of work considering that the probability of a negative outcome is very low.
rimliu 6y ago
Depends. I'd be horrified to listen to my own voice when I am not speaking. Keep in mind, what we sound very different to ourselves.
- kerkeslager 6y ago
  Presumably the guy is better at guessing what his wife wants than you are, and his wife is an adult who can tell him if he guesses wrong.
- LeifCarrotson 6y ago
  From a different perspective, I'd be brokenhearted if I could not speak to my son or my wife in something they could recognize as their father or husband's voice. I know modern TTS systems are a fair sight (voice?) better than Microsoft Sam, but it would be emotionally valuable to me to have a self-trained TTS library. I'm not sure there's a correlation to other senses, I can't see for my future self or move on his behalf. I suppose there are things I would want to taste or smell if I was going to lose those senses, but those are experiences for me, not things I'd use to communicate with loved ones. After losing my voice in an accident, I'd be willing to spend many, many hours transcribing my own speech in the handful of scratchy family videos, voicemails, and phone logs of ordinary conversations. If I could spend a couple days prior to the event reading some books, a TTS training corpus, or anniversary/birthday/wedding/etc greetings and congratulations into a microphone and have a personal text-to-speech voice I'd be all over that. It would be a little weird if someone else used it as their narrator, but that's not OP's goal. Speaking of recording books and training corpuses, my grandparents (who have their voices) got a special kind of joy from reading children's books that they once read to me and that I once heard as a child to their new grandson. OP, if you and your wife have or might have kids (and she can handle it emotionally), it might be nice to record video/audio of reading children's books to future grandchildren. Even if your future grandchild knows that grandma can't read books out loud, I'd bet Grandma would be happy to silently turn the pages for a toddler on her lap until those digital recordings got worn and scratchy like an old VHS.
- inanutshellus 6y ago
  I'd love to be able to change my mind, though. Recording audio and then choosing not to use it later is fine. Not recording it because I don't want it right now... maybe fine? maybe sad.
y-c-o-m-b 6y ago
Was just about to post the same. Not only is this an amazing thing to do for her, but this is one of the coolest threads I've seen on HN in a long time

Someone 6y ago

Is it? My first thought was “is your ideal also her ideal?”. We cannot rule out she wants to spend quality time with her partner instead of spending time in a recording studio, so that, if the worst outcome comes, her husband can remind her of what she lost.

kerkeslager 6y ago
Presumably the guy is better at guessing what his wife wants than you are, and his wife is an adult who can tell him if he guesses wrong.
- thaumasiotes 6y ago
  > his wife is an adult who can tell him if he guesses wrong She can, but she might not. A lot of that depends on how he presents the idea to her -- it might seem like something that's important to him.
  - pugworthy 6y ago
    It's sad that people trying to discuss the emotional side of this are being down voted. Honestly there is no doubt a very large emotional/personal side of this, irrespective of who's idea it is and who supports it. Technology isn't the solution for all problems and challenges in life.
    - at_a_remove 6y ago
      No, it isn't. But good lord, sometimes trying to get technical help on the Internet turns into this rabbithole of people who are specifically looking for ways not to be helpful. "Did you really want that?" "Did you consider alternatives?" "What you really have is an XY problem."
      - pugworthy 6y ago
        "Truly identifying a problem means looking deeper at the symptoms, the customer, the impact, the alternatives, the opportunity, and the relationships between them, while avoiding the “solution bias” (often known as “The issue is that the customer does not use my solution”)." #1 item from https://www.molfar.io/blog/yc-questions https://www.molfar.io/blog/yc-questions
        at_a_remove 6y ago
        Or not. Not everything has to be this super-deep, six whys exploration of how craving and attachment is the cause of all suffering and if you would only stop wanting a solution you would no longer be in pain. Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.
        pugworthy 6y ago
        If it was a cigar he’d just ask the technical question of how to capture and simulate someone’s voice.
        at_a_remove 6y ago
        "I'd like to prepare, just in case, to have technology to reproduce her voice from keyboard or other input." He then goes on to say "My ideal would be an open source 'deepfake toolkit' that allows me to provide pre-recorded samples of her speech and then TTS in her voice." That sounds like wanting to capture and simulate someone's voice.
    - kerkeslager 6y ago
      People are being downvoted because if you cannot possibly have an informed opinion on a subject, it's completely arrogant to form opinions on that subject, and even more arrogant to criticize someone publicly based on those opinions. Literally the only person on this thread who knows anything about the OP's wife is the OP. Everyone else sharing an opinion on "the emotional side of this" is vocally ignorant.
- fragmede 6y ago
  Presumably the wife is the best at knowing what she wants. I'd make no presumption, good or bad, about the their relationship dynamic, however.
DaniloDias 6y ago
By all means, let’s have hacker news expand this technical question into an evaluation of this guys marriage.
- pezo1919 6y ago
  Life is complex bro.
  - kerkeslager 6y ago
    True, but I don't think it's particularly useful to get so caught up in all the possible ways that your kindly-intentioned actions could go wrong that you need permission to even try to do kind things. That's just a form of social anxiety. And it's particularly useless when your worries are about a situation which does not concern you and which you are almost completely ignorant about.
daveFNbuck 6y ago
I think the idea here is that she could use her own voice instead of a generic voice with text to speech devices. I doubt he intends to taunt her with it.
glonq 6y ago
That was also my first thought, having seen far too many tech geeks inflict unwanted products and projects onto their poor partners and families. The sentiment is admirable, but it's a lot of work considering that the probability of a negative outcome is very low.

rimliu 6y ago

Depends. I'd be horrified to listen to my own voice when I am not speaking. Keep in mind, what we sound very different to ourselves.

kerkeslager 6y ago
Presumably the guy is better at guessing what his wife wants than you are, and his wife is an adult who can tell him if he guesses wrong.
LeifCarrotson 6y ago
From a different perspective, I'd be brokenhearted if I could not speak to my son or my wife in something they could recognize as their father or husband's voice. I know modern TTS systems are a fair sight (voice?) better than Microsoft Sam, but it would be emotionally valuable to me to have a self-trained TTS library. I'm not sure there's a correlation to other senses, I can't see for my future self or move on his behalf. I suppose there are things I would want to taste or smell if I was going to lose those senses, but those are experiences for me, not things I'd use to communicate with loved ones. After losing my voice in an accident, I'd be willing to spend many, many hours transcribing my own speech in the handful of scratchy family videos, voicemails, and phone logs of ordinary conversations. If I could spend a couple days prior to the event reading some books, a TTS training corpus, or anniversary/birthday/wedding/etc greetings and congratulations into a microphone and have a personal text-to-speech voice I'd be all over that. It would be a little weird if someone else used it as their narrator, but that's not OP's goal. Speaking of recording books and training corpuses, my grandparents (who have their voices) got a special kind of joy from reading children's books that they once read to me and that I once heard as a child to their new grandson. OP, if you and your wife have or might have kids (and she can handle it emotionally), it might be nice to record video/audio of reading children's books to future grandchildren. Even if your future grandchild knows that grandma can't read books out loud, I'd bet Grandma would be happy to silently turn the pages for a toddler on her lap until those digital recordings got worn and scratchy like an old VHS.
inanutshellus 6y ago
I'd love to be able to change my mind, though. Recording audio and then choosing not to use it later is fine. Not recording it because I don't want it right now... maybe fine? maybe sad.

y-c-o-m-b 6y ago

Was just about to post the same. Not only is this an amazing thing to do for her, but this is one of the coolest threads I've seen on HN in a long time