Earlier this year, Apple announced it was moving to AI-narrated audio books, saying it would “make the creation of audio books more accessible to everyone,” especially independent authors and small publishers.
Google is offering a similar service, which it describes as “auto-narration”.
“We have to democratize the publishing industry, because only the most famous and biggest names are converting to audio,” Tylan said.
Speechky’s Abramov said, “Synthetic narration has opened the door to old books that have never been recorded, and all future books that will never be recorded because of economics.”
Given the cost of human-based recording, he said, only about five percent of all books are converted to audiobooks.
But Abramov stressed that voice actors would also benefit from the growing market.
“They’ll make more money, they’ll make more recordings,” he said.