A browser extension to filter out "Virtual Voice" narrations from Audible search results.
If you are as annoyed by me that when you're looking for new audiobooks you see pages and pages of "Virtual Voice" narrations, then this is the add-on for you. When you're browsing audible.com this add-on looks through the search results and removes the ones which are "narrated" by a "Virtual Voice". This may result in a blank page of search results if the entire page was "narrated" by "Virtual Voice" titles. Just go on to the next page and see one or two actual audiobooks amongst the growing virtual horde.
At the time of this writing (March 2024) here is the sad state of affairs when trying to actually find an audiobook narrated by a human:
- Of the latest 100 new titles in science fiction and fantasy, only 11 are narrated by actual human beings
- Of the latest 100 new titles in mystery and trillers, only 17 are narrated by actual human beings
- Of the latest 100 new titles in romance, only 19 are narrated by actual human beings
- Of the latest 100 new titles in genre fiction, only 15 are narrated by actual human beings
- Of the latest 200 new titles in literature and fiction, only 27 (out of 200) are narrated by actual human beings
I just got tired and tired of having to scroll through all of this garbage being shoveled onto us.
Cheers and happy listening.
Before installing the add-on: a search listings page which has "Virtual Voice" "narrations" burying any actual audiobooks:
After installing the add-on: a search listings page where you can see the (1) actual human-narrated title, and the removal message to let you know the search results have been filtered:
(Note that in version 1.0.2 the message includes the number of titles that have been filtered, too.)
FIREFOX: (1.0.2 published) https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/devirtualizeaudible/
CHROME/EDGE: (1.0.2 published) https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/fegkpndgbjchmippoedipimhnedijfla/
- 1.0 - Initial release which silently removed titles without a message
- 1.0.1 - Added a generic removal message without a count
- 1.0.2 -- Includes count of elements removed and some basic sanity checks before actions
mkdir -p dist
cp -R src/firefox/ dist
cp -R src/common/* dist/firefox
bsdtar -a -cvf dist/firefox.zip LICENSE PRIVACY -C `pwd`/dist/firefox/ js icons manifest.json
Download at downloads/DevirtualizeAudible-ff-1.0.2.zip to try out in Developer mode. For Firefox, this means navigating to "about:debugging", clicking "This Firefox", and clicking "Load Temporary Add-on". (This has to be repeated each restart of Firefox until you download it from the official marketplace.)
mkdir -p dist
cp -R src/chrome/ dist
cp -R src/common/* dist/chrome
bsdtar -a -cvf dist/chrome.zip LICENSE PRIVACY -C `pwd`/dist/chrome/ js icons html manifest.json
Download at downloads/DevirtualizeAudible-chrome-1.0.2.zip to try out in Developer mode. For Edge, this means extracting the ZIP to a folder, navigating to "edge://extensions", selecting the "Developer mode" slider, and clicking "Load unpacked" and selecting the folder containing the extension files. (This will generate a warning on each restart of Edge until you can download it from the official marketplace.)