Michael Parkinson podcast a ‘positive’ use of AI - expert

A new celebrity chat podcast series featuring the late Sir Michael Parkinson as its presenter is set to launch later this year. 

The AI-generated voice of Parkinson featured on ‘Virtually Parkinson’ has been created with the consent of his family and his estate. 

Dr Dominic Lees, expert in Generative AI and synthetic media at the University of Reading, said: “This new use of voice cloning will enable Sir Michael Parkinson to conduct interviews after his death. It’s highly intriguing but may raise concerns that it’s another exploitative use of AI technology. What’s different in ‘Virtually Parkinson’ is the involvement of Sir Michael’s family in the podcast’s development - this reassures its audience that this is an ethical, consensual use of Generative AI. 

“Executive Producer Benjamin Field, of Deep Fusion Films, is a member of the University of Reading’s Synthetic Media Research Network. Our work focuses on the positive applications of Generative AI and the development of ethical frameworks for its use. 'Virtually Parkinson' is a strong example of how this is possible.