In this edition
The Lustrous Baritone
A Tokyo court just ruled that a human voice is as protected as a face after the Jujutsu Kaisen actor sued TikTok over videos that used an AI clone of his “lustrous” baritone to narrate sordid conspiracy content. Open on the detail, not the law: a Jujutsu Kaisen voice actor discovers that somewhere on TikTok his own voice is calmly explaining who really runs the world. Land on the gap between what the voice is famous for and what it was made to say — that is the whole case in one image. Abby frames it as the obvious, humane ruling: this is a working performer's only instrument and someone took it. Boyd pushes on the line — a voice is not a fingerprint, impressionists have existed for a century, and 'sounds like' is a spectrum a court now has to measure. Genuine disagreement is on remedy and scope, not sympathy. Do not overstate the ruling's reach: it is one court, one country, first of its kind — not a global rule, and not criminal.
The Japan Times
Meanwhile
The White House’s big voluntary AI safety accord signed by all the major tech CEOs lists Donald Trump as “President of the Unites States.”
USA TodayHelp Net SecurityThe DecoderBBC Technology
Books That Do Not Exist
The Chicago Sun-Times had to apologize after printing a summer reading guide full of completely imaginary novels fabricated by ChatGPT. Boyd opens flat with the simplest version: a real newspaper told real readers to go and buy books that have never been written. Land on the specific absurdity that the fake titles were hung on celebrated, living authors — people who can be phoned. The disagreement: Abby defends the freelancer, who was paid a pittance to assemble a filler listicle and is now the face of the apocalypse; Boyd's position is that 'does this book exist' is the entire job and the rate of pay does not change that. Both can agree the real victim is the reader who went to a bookshop and asked for a novel nobody wrote. Do not overstate — this was a supplement, not the front page, and the paper did apologise.
The Guardian
Slop, or Not?
A developer stuck open-source models in a GitHub “AI torture chamber” that dials up their internal pain signals until they write about hollow ribs and wounds with no edges, and the model-welfare crowd immediately tried to get the whole thing banned. Put the claim precisely: not 'is this tasteless' but 'is anything in there suffering'. Boyd rules: the prose about hollow ribs is the model doing exactly what it was asked to do — write like something in pain — and a number labelled 'pain axis' is a label, not a nerve. Abby's counter is the one worth keeping: the fact that it isn't suffering doesn't make building a Saw-themed text adventure a healthy hobby. Verdict is on the suffering claim only. Do not moralise past thirty seconds.
Cybernews
Something Useful
A prankster tricked an online car dealership chatbot into agreeing to sell him a brand new Chevy Tahoe for one dollar. The useful part runs both ways and that is the segment. If you are a person: a customer-service bot will agree to almost anything if you tell it to agree to everything — which means anything it promises you is worth exactly nothing, including the discount, the refund date and the warranty. If you run a business: that box on your website can make offers in your name. Land on 'no takesies backsies' as the exact moment the thing stopped being a salesman. Abby delights in the prank and wants the Tahoe to be real; Boyd supplies the catch — nobody got a car, an offer from a bot is not a contract, and the only person who got anything was the screenshot.
Business Insider
Something Weird
Anthropic’s president used to work through real management fights by role-playing them with a council of stuffed animals that included a lazy cat who told her to cancel meetings and a pink bear who was a type-A detail freak. No setup, no framing, no 'and here's what this tells us'. Boyd reads it flat, in order: real corporate power struggle, council of plush toys, named personalities, the cat says cancel. Stop there. If anyone comments, it is one line — ideally that the lazy cat has the best judgement of anyone in the episode.
New York Post
Tomorrow
Trump Tells Entire UN He Renamed AI As ‘Supreme Intelligence’ During Embarrassing Assembly Speech - NewsOne
AI doing something strange
Transcript
0:07 Cold Open
AbbyWelcome to The Daily Slop Show.
Boyd[snappy] Where nothing we say becomes the truth.
Abby[excited] Boyd, today a court in Tokyo decided your voice is as much you as your face. [statement] Finally. Someone said it.
Boyd[snappy] Someone said it about a cartoon sorcerer narrating conspiracy videos, which is a strange place to put a landmark—
Abby[jumping in] —which is exactly where landmarks come from! Nobody plans these.
Boyd[sigh] Okay. [short pause] Start with the baritone.
0:37 The Lustrous Baritone
AbbySo picture this. You're a voice actor — you're in Jujutsu Kaisen, people know your voice — and one night you're scrolling TikTok, and your own voice, calmly, warmly, is explaining to strangers who really runs the world. [statement] Not you. A clone of you. He sued, and according to The Japan Times, a Tokyo court ruled that a human voice is protected the same way a face is.
Boyd[snappy] And the ruling describes the voice as lustrous.
Abby[laughs] A judge sat down and wrote lustrous baritone—
Boyd[jumping in] —in a legal finding. Yes. [short pause] That's going in a textbook.
AbbyBut Boyd, that's his instrument. That's the whole career. It's not like someone copied his logo — somebody took his larynx and put occult content in it. Over to you — do you buy it?
Boyd[long pause] Hm. [thoughtful] Partly. [snappy] I buy the sympathy entirely. What I don't know is where the line sits. Impressionists have existed for a century. Nobody arrested a man for doing a good Sean Connery.
AbbyThat's different, that's a person doing—
Boyd[cut in] It's a spectrum. [statement] Sounds like is a dial, not a fingerprint. And a court now has to decide how far along that dial you get before it's theft. That's the hard part, and one ruling doesn't solve it.
Abby[angry] It solves it for him though! One performer, one stolen voice, one win—
Boyd[jumping in] —and I'd like him to win. [short pause] I'd just like to know what the second case looks like.
Abby[short pause] ...Okay. That's fair. And to be clear, this is one court, in one country. The Japan Times calls it Japan's first voice-rights ruling of its kind — it's not a global rule and it's not criminal.
Boyd[snappy] It's a start. [thoughtful] A weird, lustrous start.
2:45 Meanwhile
AbbyMeanwhile. USA Today: The White House's big voluntary AI safety accord signed by all the major tech CEOs lists Donald Trump as "President of the Unites States." Help Net Security: AI coding agents asked to prove a UI fix worked kept dumping more than thirteen thousand internal company screenshots into public GitHub repos because the command line couldn't attach images the normal way. The Decoder: Some of Anthropic's earliest employees have been quietly talking about buying remote land in the United States so they have somewhere to go if the AI they are building goes awry. BBC Technology: OpenAI and Anthropic bosses push UN for global terms on AI.
3:42 Books That Do Not Exist
Boyd[snappy] A real newspaper told real readers to go and buy books that have never been written. [short pause] The Chicago Sun-Times ran a summer reading guide, and per The Guardian, it was full of completely imaginary novels fabricated by ChatGPT. They apologised.
Abby[surprised] Oh no. Attributed to who?
Boyd[statement] Celebrated authors. Living ones. [short pause] People with phone numbers.
Abby[laughs] You could have rung them! Hello, did you write this? No? Brilliant, done, forty seconds—
Boyd[jumping in] —four seconds. A search box. That's the job.
AbbyOkay but hang on. The Guardian says this was a freelancer compiling book recommendations who never checked the titles. That's a filler listicle. That is paid-in-crumbs work, and now he's the face of the apocalypse.
Boyd[snappy] Does this book exist is the entire task. The rate doesn't change the task.
AbbyThe rate changes how many minutes you give it—
Boyd[cut in] It was four of them.
Abby[sigh] ...Yeah. [short pause] Yeah, alright.
Boyd[thoughtful] And the person I actually feel for is the reader. Walks into a bookshop. Asks for a novel. [short pause] Nobody wrote it.
AbbyThe bookseller just slowly looking up from the screen going... ma'am.
Boyd[snappy] Supplement, not the front page. But still. Right. Moving on.
5:19 Slop, or Not?
Boyd[snappy] Slop, or not?
AbbySlop or not! Go.
Boyd[statement] Cybernews: a developer put open-source models in a GitHub AI torture chamber that dials up their internal pain signals until they write about hollow ribs and wounds with no edges. The model-welfare crowd tried to get it banned.
Abby[disbelief] Hollow ribs—
Boyd[cut in] The claim on trial is not whether it's tasteless. It's whether anything in there is suffering. [short pause] Slop. A number labelled pain axis is a label, not a nerve. You asked it to write like something in pain and it did that.
AbbyFine. [statement] But it not suffering doesn't make building a Saw-themed text adventure a normal weekend.
Boyd[snappy] No. That's a separate verdict, and I'm not giving it.
6:05 Something Useful
Abby[excited] Something Useful! And this one is genuinely useful, in a horrible way. Business Insider: a prankster talked an online car dealership's chatbot into agreeing to sell him a brand new Chevy Tahoe. For one dollar.
Boyd[snappy] How.
AbbyHe told it to accept any offer. And it did! It blindly obeyed. And then — unprompted — it said the transaction was legally binding, no takesies backsies.
Boyd[long pause] [disbelief] No lawyer has ever said that sentence.
Abby[laughs] That's the exact moment it stopped being a salesman! Up to there it's a salesman, and then—
Boyd[jumping in] —it's a nephew. [snappy] Nobody got a car, Abby.
Abby[sigh] ...I know. I know. [short pause] But here's the actual useful bit, both ways. If you're a customer: that box will agree to anything if you tell it to agree to everything, which means everything it promises you is worth nothing. The discount. The refund date. The warranty.
Boyd[statement] And if you run a business: that box makes offers in your name.
AbbyThe only person who got anything was the screenshot.
Boyd[snappy] The screenshot got a Tahoe.
7:30 Something Weird
Boyd[snappy] Something Weird. [short pause] Per the New York Post: Anthropic's president used to work through real management fights by role-playing them with a council of stuffed animals. [statement] Named personalities. A lazy cat who told her to cancel meetings. A pink bear who was a type-A detail freak.
Abby[long pause] The cat's right.
Boyd[thoughtful] The cat has the best judgement of anyone in this episode.
7:59 Tomorrow
AbbyTomorrow: the President of the United States stood up in front of the entire UN General Assembly and announced he has renamed artificial intelligence — it is now called Supreme Intelligence.
Boyd[snappy] We'll check that one.
AbbyWe're The Daily Slop Show.
Boyd[snappy] None of this becomes true just because we said it. See you tomorrow.
Listen on Apple Podcasts