Callers to Washington state hotline press 2 for Spanish and get accented AI English instead
For months, callers to the Washington state Department of Licensing who have requested automated service in Spanish have instead heard an AI voice speaking English in a strong Spanish accent. The agency has since apologized and says it’s trying to fix the problem.
AI is putting threatening to put The Onion out of business, not because The Onion articles can be written by AI, rather AI has just made this kind of satire nearly obsolete. The Onion is forced to retreat into existential screaming into the void humor, which they have done magnificently in the face of an unstoppable foe. The Onion will prevail and outlive AI though, mark my words!
https://apnews.com/article/washington-dol-spanish-accent-ai-3a1b8438a5674c07242a8d48c057d5a3Open linkView original on sopuli.xyz557
Comments49
Roger, Roger.
What's your vector, Victor?
Over, Oveur
Do you like watching gladiator movies, Joey?
Do you ever hang out in gymnasiums?
I'm on smoko!
So leave me alone!
"leava me alono!"
Oh dear I'm sorry I have a serious commenting problem!
Many years ago I was in Latin America with two other English speakers, one who spoke Spanish well, and the third kept asking for translations..."Steve, Steve, how do I say "box"? Boxo. "Steve, Steve, how do I say "gas cap"? Capo. That went on for a while.
This is hilarious. I work on translation software and know exactly what's wrong. They've selected a spanish voice, but not translated the content to spanish. I was playing around with these settings in our software and produced exactly this result.
It'd be hilarious if you could choose that as an option. I'd like to pick between a hundred different accents. lol
You can do this with a good deal of TTS programs.
It can be very funny to give a paragraph in English to a Portuguese or Japanese or French TTS model.
Back in the 80s, my dad worked with telephone testing equipment and had reason to bring home a DecTalk. I spent so much time fucking around with that thing. Typing things like "sheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeit" was so hilarious. I'd write entire scripts.
I guess the tech is to the point now where I could lose days to it now. lol.
I'm a bit younger, but early Ventrilo had a TTS that basically was so bad, and so easy to spam and break with nonsense that servers would either have it totally turned off, or kick/ban you if you spammed soi soi soi or something.
... And then of course.... there was that one time John Madden made it to the Moon...
Or.... you can turn it into music:
https://youtube.com/watch?v=T9vXGlaNKg0
I... guess you could call that TTS acapella?
I think you can hear an example here: https://www.spokanepublicradio.org/regional-news/2026-02-26/couple-asks-wa-dol-for-spanish-speaker-and-gets-a-recording-in-accented-english-instead
🤣 priceless!
You know there are vibe coders who don’t even try to run the code before uploading it. Apparently, those very same people make phone services too. Just do everything with AI, and ship it without checking anything at all. Full steam ahead, never look back.
And they get paid the same amount as normal developers. And probably get paid to fix all the mistakes they make.
That doesn’t sound like an AI voice in that it used generative AI. It sounds like someone just fed the English into a Hispanic voice on a regular text to speech engine. I could be wrong though.
Or maybe somebody wrote an AI prompt that said "hey make this voice file sound Spanish".
PLEASE PRESS UNO
Cue Chris Farley translating "el niño"
https://youtu.be/H0-pHnykC9s
Thanks for the link.
I couldn't see anything there (but it sounds like some could) - anyone else has problems, try this one - it's in the latter half: https://www.tiktok.com/@maya_maybee/video/7608347117161041183
Ah, man...... I know it's a screwup and it's just hilarious.
My friends got a funnier version of this. The local elementary school has a service that translates automated phone messages for parents into any language.
She's bilingual, but her mother only speaks Russian and shes been teaching the kids Russian. So she gets each message, 2x, once in english, and once in Russian. But, whenever the system hits a loan word, or word that is the same in both languages, (superintendent was the word it hit when I was driving with her thw other day)
it gets derailed, and finishes in english with a really over the top Russian accent.
Not the same Russian voice mind you, it switched from a woman speeking fairly fast to a man speaking english slowly and angrily, with a Russian accent, like it was trained off of cold war movie 'Soviets or something.
That's so fucking weird! I wish we could hear a recording. That's amazing.
This is hilarious, but in a I can’t believe how fucking absurd and stupid way.
They didn’t even bother QAing the pre recorded messages by listening once.
I feel terrible having done this to Picard...
Or some racist fucker was responsible for this.
It was almost definitely both.
Well…I laughed. I’ll just see myself to hell now.
We are all going there together.
Oh I LOL'd my friend... I'll fix you a chair next to mine in hell
Something about "says it's trying to fix the problem" is really funny to me 😭
Yeah, as if that kind of thing could be done by accident. Or maybe it can IDK.
Damn that is comically absurd
Before long, we wouldn't need The Onion anymore with all this nonsense!
"para Espanol, oprima El Numero dos"
Beep
"Aye Chihuahua! You wanna tortilla? I got some tequila! Come on hombre! How you doin ehhh? Orale senior I think you gotta problem yeah?"
"¿...Que carajo es esta mierda?"
“Hey fool, we heard you like, want a license to drive and shit. Press uno if you only have one card left, hahahaha just kidding just kidding calm down. Press numero two if you want to drive. Press numero three if you’re a cabrón and have to reschedule a failed test, or press numero four if you like, wanna talk about your feeling or some shit. If you want to repeat these options press that hash homie, and thank you for calling the Washington state Department of Pendejos that get to decide that yours truly has to ride a fucking bike everywhere in the wet-ass rain. *whistles good bye”
My kids' elementary school had the opposite sort of message, the principal saying, in a flat slightly southern US accent - si quieres Espanol oprima el numero dos, like such an accent I am not sure anyone who spoke only Spanish would know what she was saying.
See
Kee-yer-is
Ess pan ohl
Oh pree muh
Ell
Noo mur oh
Dowhs.
Many years ago when t-mobile first debuted their "visual voicemail" that did automated transcription, my dad brought me his phone and wanted to know what the hell has happened with one of his messages. It said something like "Parrot vegan spaniel primo wavy." I showed him that he could still press a button to listen to the actual message, and it was from Walgreens; the computer had been trying to transcribe the Spanish voice saying "para diga en Espanol, oprima nueve."
Was it Peggy Hill?
"trying to fix the problem"
Oh dear God that is frankly horrifying.
U.S.S. Ford is going to get sunk, isn't it? "we're trying to fix it" you motherfuckers
Always grimly funny when you can basically suss out the lazy-ass prompt: "Now do the same message, but Spanish."
It's nice to know that AI can still give us that good old human touch in the form of blatant racism.
Somebody go ahead and shoot me, please. I want off this mother loving ride.
So all aboard for the American tour
And maybe you'll make it to the top
And mind how you go, and I can tell you, 'cause I know
You may find it hard to get off
Thanks antidepressants :(
Cheech Marin, perhaps?