Spotify launches AI DJ that will choose songs and talk to you

Automated DJ is powered by technology from OpenAI, which created ChatGPT

(Getty Images for Spotify)

Spotify is releasing an automated DJ, that will choose songs and talk about them to you.

The tool is just the latest incursion of artificial intelligence into culture. It comes just days after AI authors flooded Amazon, and a sci-fi magazine was forced to close submissions after being bombarded with automatically created text.

The new feature, named “AI DJ”, is personalised and will pick songs based on people’s listening history. As with much on the platform, it will use that history to select new releases that users might like, as well as old songs they have listened to.

But the new feature will allow the system to talk to users as it does. By using technology from OpenAI, which created ChatGPT, it will generate facts about the music or genre that is playing, and then use an automated voice to tell listeners about them.

The facts appear to be generated by real people. But they will then be fed into a generative artificial intelligence, so that they can personalised and made specific.

That text will then be put into other technology that comes from the acquisition of Sonantic, another artificial intelligence firm. That can be used to read out text in what Spotify says are “stunningly realistic voices”.

The first of those voices is built on that of Xavier ‘X’ Jernigan, Spotify’s head of cultural partnerships. He was a host on one of Spotify’s podcasts.

More voices will come in time, Spotify suggested.

The feature is rolling out now in English, for users in the US and Canada. It can be accessed by heading to the Home page, clicking on the Music Feed, and pressing “play” on the DJ card. That should start it playing, and users will then have the option to choose different music.

Spotify suggests in its announcement that other changes are coming.

“At Spotify we’re uniquely positioned to transform audio,” it said We’re always looking for innovative new ways to improve our users’ listening experiences to meet their needs—so stay tuned for more.