Amazon Quietly Rolls Back Its AI Anime Dubs After Massive Backlash

In the AI ​​bubble era are companies being forced to learn the same lessons over and over again: The reaction that almost stops them from doing stupid things with generic AI in private? It’s going to be just as bad, if not worse, when they inevitably start doing it in public.

Amazon has learned that it’s no fun to yell loudly. Last weekend, the company’s Prime Video streamer faced public outcry when it quietly began rolling out a beta program that provided artificial dubs in both English and Spanish to many of the anime movies and series available on the platform. Aside from the generally severe lack of actual human cast members and the latest ammo in the elitist culture wars about the quality of dubbed anime versus subtitled originals, the dubs were united by one singular thing: they all sucked ass.

Thankfully, whether it’s the fact that he sucked ass or just getting very tired of being yelled at by Prime Video anime fans and voice actors alike (which includes Evangelion Dub actor Damon Mills, who went viral for criticizing the company that previously hired him to dub the role of Kaworu Nagisa for the remake film Saga of the mecha series), heard from someone on the streamer. Many English language AI dubs for anime such as banana fish, No Game No Life: ZeroAnd many have now been removed, although Spanish-language equivalents still remain on many titles at the time of writing.

io9 has contacted Amazon for comment on the rollout and sudden removal of the AI ​​dub and will update this post when we hear back.

Amazon’s public embarrassment is the latest in a series of studios worried about suffering the consequences of a lack of AI in their projects. Over the summer, a Wall Street Journal report alleged that Disney botched several attempts to integrate generic AI into the production of both. Tron:Ares and live-action Moana The remake, only to be held back for public viewing due to copyright ownership concerns and fear of a public relations nightmare due to its use of AI, had to be scaled back.

Despite that concern, Disney announced that it plans to heavily integrate generative AI features into its own streaming platform Disney+, with CEO Bob Iger recently telling shareholders that it is working on plans that will allow users to be able to create their own generative AI content with Disney characters directly on the streamer. Maybe they should look over Prime Video’s shoulder and take a hint before moving forward with the planning stages?

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