Passengers on ScotRail trains have been noticing a new voice announcing the station arrivals and some have not been pleased.
The new announcer, called Iona, has recently taken over on some routes. But unlike her predecessors, she is not real.
Previously announcements were pre-recorded by a Scottish voice artist, but Iona is a synthetic voice which uses an AI model to deliver typed messages in a “Scottish accent”.
ScotRail urged passengers to “give it time and it may grow on you”.
It said tricky place names such as Milngavie and Achnasheen are inputted phonetically as “Mill-guy” and “Akna-sheen” to help the software avoid embarrassing mistakes.
Although the technology has not yet been fully implemented, some passengers have already voiced their unhappiness with the change.
One passenger told BBC Scotland: “It was weird. I could tell it was AI because it sounded so robotic.”
Another posted on X that the voice sounds unsure of what it is saying and questions everything.
One passenger described it as an “AI lassie” that was “so horrible and unnatural”.
In response, ScotRail said: “Sorry you’re not a fan. I love the new voice but appreciate it may not to be everyone’s liking. Give it time and it may grow on you.”
he new announcer was developed by global technology company, ReadSpeaker, which has over 50 language iterations of its text-to-speech software.
The team also AI-generated an image that matched the name Iona to feature on their website.
The end result is a red-haired woman wearing a woolly orange scarf and green jacket stood in the middle of a Scottish glen.