NotebookLM: Podcasting in Uncanny Valley

AI generated image 

Google's NotebookLM research tool has been around since 2023 but the 'deep dive' Audio Overview feature - making it a breeze to create an instant podcast-like conversation on any topic with two AI 'hosts' - really made waves in the media. On a first listen, the conversations can easily be mistaken for real podcast episodes with two human hosts but, after listening to them a bit more, it's obvious that something just isn't quite right. In fact, the way I see it, there's pretty much that's all wrong.

The AI hosts engage in an exaggerated rapid fire, light-hearted banter that in many ways sounds like a twisted parody of 'The Daily' podcast. No matter how serious the source material might be, the tone is always unaltered repeating the same worn out phrases over and over, the hosts jokingly confirming each other's views. 'Exactly! Exaaactly! Absolutely!' are some of the way too frequent NLM favorites, together with exclamations like 'whoa!' , 'tell me about it!' and 'heavy stuff' occasionally accompanied with a quick burst of truly uncanny-valley laughter. The hosts also sometimes refer to themselves as 'we humans' and they even talk about their very own(!) children in a way that is right out disturbing. Other kinds of hallucinations are there as well; for example, in one of the AI Overviews I created the hosts mentioned my son. Definitely interesting since I still firmly believe I don't have any children at all.

The NotebookLM voices are good, very good. It is obvious that soon - today?! - there's no way to distinguish an AI generated voice from a flesh and blood human one. However, as a podcaster, artificial intelligence just can not compete with us mortals. The explanation is simple: an advanced auto complete function, regardless of the digital steroids injected, can never have a unique personality that's the very hallmark of a human podcast host.

So, is it Cool? To start with, sure, but after a while - nope. Instead I get this slight feeling of nausea when listening to these fake podcasts. Luckily, there's a great and immediate remedy: turning the bots off! NotebookLM is definitely useful even if you skip the hyped all-American AI podcast hosts.