The $2.5K AI Voice Deal: A Lifetime of Regret

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(Transcribed by TurboScribe.ai. Go Unlimited to remove this message.) Y'all ready to be history?

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Get started.

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Welcome Hi Hi Hi Hello everyone!

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To the Pro Audio Suite These guys are

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professional, they're motivated.

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With Tech the VO Stars George Witton Founder

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of Source Elements Robert Marshall International Audio Engineer

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Darren Robbo Robertson and Global Voice Andrew Peters

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Thanks to Triboo Austrian Audio Making Passion Heard

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Source Elements George the Tech Witton and Robbo

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and AP's International Demos To find out more

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about us check theproaudiosuite.com Line up, man!

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Here we go!

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And welcome to another Pro Audio Suite Thanks

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to Austrian Audio Making Passion Heard and Tribooth

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Don't forget the code T-R-I-P

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-A-P-200 and that will get you

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$200 US off your Tribooth Now, AI Topic

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of the year Topic of the Topic of

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the decade Topic of the century You know,

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century really It's a wild beast that's on

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the run Ah, it's crazy More and more

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difficult to haul in, unfortunately But you came

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across something One of your mates sent you

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a request An audition request And the contract

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or the brief is a little bit odd

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Just wow I mean, go back to last

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week, right?

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What we were talking about SAG-AFTRA and

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their contracts and all that sort of stuff

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Here's your reason why No names, no pact

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drill But there's a clause in this contract

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that says Just quickly The overview of the

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contract is basically that you sign up your

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voice to this product And that's all that's

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restricted to So they can only use it

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for this product But this is the line

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that made me go, what the It says

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By participating, the voice selected will grant the

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brand perpetual, irrevocable and unrestricted rights to use,

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modify and reproduce the AI voice exclusively for

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the two specified products How much are they

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paying?

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Two and a half grand US for a

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voice in perpetuity that you can never get

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back Yeah That's just madness You know, the

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crazy thing is Someone will do it Yeah,

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they will And that's the sad part And

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I think to put last week's episode with

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SAG-AFTRA about SAG-AFTRA and their contracts

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in perspective This is why Yeah This is

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why they're putting their foot down and demanding

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that stuff Because that's just, that's our line

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It really is That's just, in all fairness

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That's almost abuse That's them recognizing that there

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is someone out there who'll go, what the,

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I'll take the two and a half Knowing

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that they're doing the wrong thing, surely Yeah,

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as George and Robert are not with us

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for this episode I will use one of

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Robert's lines And that is, it's theft And

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it is theft It is, I agree Yeah,

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it's playing on the mentality that someone out

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there's going I've been trying and trying to

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get voiceover work for however long and you

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know I'm not getting the amount of work

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I am Someone's offering me two and a

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half grand I'll just take it, thank you

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very much Yeah, the trouble is of course

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Once that thing is being used, that's it

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It's never, you're never going to get it

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back Whatever that product is They're never going

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to use you again Because they've already got

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you So that's it, two and a half

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grand And that could be for decades And

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what if that product goes on to like,

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you know Be another iPhone or something like

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that, you know It's like, you've just signed

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your life away Seriously I think there's also

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another line in there about being used for

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other products Was there something in there?

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It says, the intended usage of the files

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is to create an external facing AI voice

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clone That is limited to two of the

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client's product lines As well as any future

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products, services or extensions derived from Or related

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to these two product lines Yeah, there you

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go That's the sketchy bit as well That's

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right So I mean, you know So if

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they come up with an iPhone and then

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they go We're going to make an iPod

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You know, or we're going to make some,

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you know, eye earbuds or whatever Then all

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of a sudden they've got your voice there

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as well Unless you want to go to

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court and fight it Which you're never going

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to have the money to do Or find

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them or whatever else to even do that

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If you're taking two and a half grand

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for an AI voice in perpetuity You certainly

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haven't got the funds to take anyone to

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court Well, yeah, there you go, exactly So

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I mean, do you reckon it's intentional?

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I mean, I kind of feel like it

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is I kind of feel like these guys

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are just praying now They're just going, well,

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you know, we've seen in the past that

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people will just do this So let's just

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chuck it out there and see what we

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catch Well, the interesting thing is if you

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look at the current rates The way it

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works is if you get paid per cut

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down So if you do a 30-second

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read and they go Look, we're going to

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do a 15-second cut down And we're

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going to do a 10-second cut down

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You'll get three fees That's how it works

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Yeah, that's right And that's for the usage

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of that product of that commercial Three cuts

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wherever it's being used, blah, blah, blah This

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one, there is no like if we do

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a cut down or we do whatever There's

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no extra fee, that's it You're done, you're

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cooked All right, well, here you go So

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I've just noticed this The recording fee is

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two and a half thousand US dollars Which

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equates to $250 per finished hour of audio

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That's finished hour So obviously you're doing some

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editing in there as well So you're probably

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getting about 50 bucks an hour Yeah, to

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do this, to sign it away forever Yeah,

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yeah You're not just eat your voice To

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sign your voice away forever Yeah, because they

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want it all edited It all done, no

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processing But a full edit, deep breath, blah,

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blah, blah And of course they say there's

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no exclusivity expected But the problem is, you

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know Once you're on this product, whatever it

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is No one else is going to hire

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you for the same product Because you're already

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on that Yeah, and usually if it's a

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big product, they'll ask Yeah, that's right So

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they've got exclusivity built in anyway They don't

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need to say it's exclusive Exactly God, seriously

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It's unbelievable, isn't it?

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It's just out of control It is out

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of control And hopefully with Nava and all

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the other bodies around the world Who are

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combating AI and trying to get us Some

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kind of protection against AI Yeah Hopefully they

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can stop it But I've got a horrid

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feeling Yeah It ain't gonna happen Well, this

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was sent to me by this mate of

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mine Because he was sort of saying, what's

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your thoughts?

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And what I said to him was, mate,

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you've got no comeback And you've basically sold

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yourself out At the beginning of your career,

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you've sold something out That you might go,

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what the hell did I do that for

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in five years from now Or something, you

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know Particularly when you're looking at If you're

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watching YouTube and you get those ads pop

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up That you know it's an AI voice

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Really awful ads Oh yeah, God, there's many

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of those at the moment That could be

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the person who takes this job Yeah, that's

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right It's heard globally Yeah, everywhere That really

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annoying voice on TikTok That American whatever, it's

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everywhere It's on YouTube and TikTok and Instagram

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I can't think of it Hopefully it was

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like a mash-up One of those ones

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where AI mashes it up If that guy

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does exist and is trying to get other

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work He's screwed royally Yeah, if you're everywhere

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Yeah, because he will forever be that voice

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You know, it's crazy Please, look, I know

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it You know, I understand how tempting it

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is I mean, God, especially if you're in

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Australia Two and a half grand US is

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tempting You know, that's close to five grand

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Aussie You know, and for some people that

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may be For some people who sort of

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do voiceover as a second gig That may

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be tempting But just think about what you're

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signing away Yeah Really, please do I mean,

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I get it I know times are tough

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But is five grand really worth the rest

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of your career?

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I don't think so I don't think so

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Short-term fix for long-term pain Absolutely

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