Australian radio station CADA stunned listeners by revealing the secret identity of its host. For several months, the daytime show “Workdays with Thy” was hosted by artificial intelligence, and almost none of the audience noticed. The program, which daily combines hip-hop, R&B, and pop, sounded so natural that thousands of listeners were convinced there was a real person behind the microphone.
CADA’s owner, ARN Media, confirmed that the host Thy is an AI avatar created based on the voice and appearance of a finance department employee. For the voice, they used ElevenLabs, and there was no mention of artificial intelligence on the show’s official website. Only after an investigation by local media did it become known that the beloved on-air voice actually belonged to AI, not a human.
Since November last year, “Workdays with Thy” has attracted at least seventy-two thousand listeners every week. ARN Media CEO Ciaran Davis noted that the company is only exploring the technology’s capabilities and observing the audience’s reaction. Similar experiments have already been conducted by radio stations in the US and Europe, and in some cases, such attempts have led to the dismissal of real hosts and subsequent scandals over the use of AI on air.
