We Watched Peacock’s New AI Replicant of Al Michaels

AI or Al? Photo: Peacock

This story originally ran June 26. We’re republishing it today as the 2024 Summer Olympics begin. See the daily schedule and follow our coverage here.

The machines may yet conquer the world, but first they’ve set their eyes on sports announcing. Peacock, the streaming home of this year’s Summer Olympics, is rolling out a new tool that gives you daily video recaps narrated by a computer doing an uncanny-valley Al Michaels impersonation. Called “Your Daily Olympic Recap on Peacock,� it’s a 10-minute supercut personalized based on the sports and events you opt in to in the service’s Olympics coverage and serves as a highlight reel with a “high-quality AI re-creation of Michaels’s voice.�

The product — which will live on Peacock’s web browsers, iOS, and iPad apps — will mine Michaels’s long sportscasting career at NBC to synthesize his intonations and pair that synthesized commentary with video from the Olympic events that aired the previous day. A team of sports editors reviews “all content, including audio and clips� ahead of time for quality control, Peacock promises. And across Olympics’ sports categories, the AI can generate as many as 7 million permutations of the videos. “When I was approached about this, I was skeptical but obviously curious,� says Michaels. “Then I saw a demonstration detailing what they had in mind. I said, ‘I’m in.’�

Vulture and other outlets were also shown a demo, which you can watch below. The video clips are as serviceable as any recap video you’d watch elsewhere, but the performance of Michaels’s synthezoid voice left much to be desired. Peacock’s large language model and team of editors attempt to account for pauses, breaths, and shifts in energy, and to some extent it does, especially in introducing the day’s playlist. But as the audio goes deeper, in describing the new and dramatic events, the AI model’s performance settles into a flat, by-the-numbers tone, even as it describes stirring wins and crushing defeats. Some of the commentary sounds oddly asifitrunstogetherlikethisinaslurryofsyllables.

It also accomplishes nothing toward the stated goal of matching Michaels’s “signature expertise and elocution� — it’s certainly not a copy of his brain, nor of the excitement of watching a sportscaster express genuine emotion. (And from what we’ve seen so far, it seems to lack Al’s penchant for making sly gambling references during his calls.) As complex as the process is, it just amounts to cobbling words and sounds together. At least you can fully opt out of this one (and any concern that you’ll inadvertently damage the environment by using it during the “hottest Olympics on record�) in Peacock’s settings starting with its rollout on July 27th, if you so choose.