Legendary sportscaster Al Michaels is set to give daily, personalised recaps of the Paris Olympics on Peacock. However, it will be different from the accurate Al Michaels doing the announcing. Instead, you’ll hear an AI-generated voice that sounds just like him. Imagine hearing a sports announcer’s voice in a video game like Madden, but this time, it’s talking about actual Olympic events.
Setting up your daily Olympic recap
You need to follow a simple setup process to get your daily Olympic recap in the Peacock app. First, you’ll provide your name. NBC states that the AI voice can greet most people by first name. Next, you choose up to three types of sports that interest you and up to two highlights, such as “Top Competition” or “Viral & Trending Moments.” Each morning, you’ll receive a rundown led by the AI version of Al Michaels.
Ensuring accuracy and quality
To maintain the quality and accuracy of the recaps, NBC has a team of editors who will review all content, including audio and clips, before making them available. Despite this, there’s still a slight chance that an AI-generated error might slip through, like mentioning the wrong athlete or confusing an unusual outcome in a sport.
The voice you’ll hear was trained using Michael’s past appearances on NBC. According to NBCUniversal’s John Jelley, their in-house engineers, product managers, and data scientists developed a proprietary process to integrate, optimise, and validate cutting-edge language models and voice synthesis technology to create this experience.
The AI-generated voice sounded convincing in a press demo, as you’d expect from a demo. However, the real test will come when it’s generating millions of unique clips. NBC estimates there could be nearly 7 million personalised recaps in the US alone during the games. These clips will cover dozens of sports, each with unique terminology, and identify various athletes worldwide.
When and where to access the recaps
The AI-driven Al Michaels recaps will be available starting July 27 in supported browsers and the iOS and iPadOS Peacock apps. NBC has not commented on whether the recaps will be available on Android devices. The first recap edition will feature highlights from the opening ceremony, with personalised recaps beginning on July 28.
