For now, Dessa remains a research preview rather than a publicly available product.
Shock and awe
Dessa’s demo quickly drew attention on social media, with some users praising how natural the interactions sounded.
X user Alexander Hoff said he had never “heard anything artificial that sounded so… human,” while user Hesamation described it as “straight up sci-fi stuff.
Binance founder Changpeng “CZ” Zhao also chimed in, pointing to potential uses in education, where natural voice interactions could help children learn through conversation.
“This might be very good for GiggleAcademy. Teaching kids in current ‘AI voice’ was a challenge,” Zhao wrote, referring to his education project.
But the same humanlike qualities that impressed some listeners raised concerns among others about the technology’s potential for deception.
Filmmaker Justine Bateman questioned why AI voices need to sound human, arguing that it could be used to mislead people. “So you can trick people into lowering their guard,” she wrote.
Journalist Shiv Aroor raised similar concerns about fraud, writing, “Scam calls about to attain pandemic level.”
Dessa comes from Block, which operates Square, Cash App, bitcoin wallet Bitkey and bitcoin mining hardware unit Proto. Its AI research lab reports directly to Dorsey and includes former staff from Toronto-based AI startup Dessa, which Square acquired in 2020.
