Noice piece Justin, I'm thinking about the possibility that AI generated content can do something nasty as well ie make brain stem-hacking mind and body numbing content 10x more compelling than we already have it. Predictions on this?
Totally. I think that for some people it will indeed get VERY compelling, similarly to how some people find non-drug activities like gambling or porn basically irresistable to the degree it ruins their life. Hopefully society can find a way to protect those people, because when you look at how many of us are addicted to our phones, it's a heck of a lot more than there are gambling and porn addicts.
Yes to the idea of humans being interested in other humans! I agree with you and believe that once the AI content saturation arrives, everyone will be even more interested in truly human creations, like art and writing and stuff...
As an artist and small publisher, that's my hope anyway.
FWIW, I've completely left the "social" platforms completely and haven't missed them at all!
I can predict very little about the future. All I can say with a modicum of certainty is that AI art and whatnot will have a moment, like synthpop did in the 80s. Then a backlash to all that overproduced stuff will come. After that it will come back but a) it will be one of many aesthetics; 2) it will primarily read as a style of the past more than of the future
You are spot on in your conclusions. It looks like we have had similar experiences trying to discuss these topics with others.
Some thoughts for consideration:
If the whole premise of this more colorful dreck is better, more profitable dreck, can the massive volume of dreck and the basic state of AI break or make useless functions like search?
I posit that it already has.
After searching for images of fine art paintings, I was assailed by a deluge of AI crap. Further qualifiers like historical, classical, oil paintings , etc. didn’t change the result. I stopped after seeing ‘Formless Blob #2’ and odd colored cow paintings, along with a tasteless AI adaptation of ‘Lady with a Ferret’.
It seems every piece of digital art is Fine Art in our brave new world. Art history erased? This obfuscation is not just in images.
It appears that someone is using AI to actively obfuscate by generating low quality peer reviewed research papers and attributing them to unknown authors in 3rd world countries. Can one researcher even write 80 papers in 6 months —not to mention the actual research? That is a paper every 32 hours. It doesn’t stop media sources from quoting this accelerating mound of feces. If AI actually gets better, who will able to distinguish real research from unreal?
As for addiction, look up Raid Shadow Legends Kraken on YouTube. Can you believe people spend more than a large house payment each month on a gaming app? One Kraken spent $70k last year alone. Paying for pixels when you are assaulted by every casino trick to make you lust for that next hit of dopamine. It is legalized gambling with champion battles. This is not uncommon across lots of game types.
There is so much more, but this comment is long enough. Thanks for the great piece. It’s nice to know that someone else thinks about this too.
Noice piece Justin, I'm thinking about the possibility that AI generated content can do something nasty as well ie make brain stem-hacking mind and body numbing content 10x more compelling than we already have it. Predictions on this?
Totally. I think that for some people it will indeed get VERY compelling, similarly to how some people find non-drug activities like gambling or porn basically irresistable to the degree it ruins their life. Hopefully society can find a way to protect those people, because when you look at how many of us are addicted to our phones, it's a heck of a lot more than there are gambling and porn addicts.
This sparked a random idea to use AI to totally balance my presence on social media. To basically defeat the algorithm by enforced blandness.
I'm not sure whether to praise or fear you for that idea 😅
(also "Enforced blandness" is great)
Yes to the idea of humans being interested in other humans! I agree with you and believe that once the AI content saturation arrives, everyone will be even more interested in truly human creations, like art and writing and stuff...
As an artist and small publisher, that's my hope anyway.
FWIW, I've completely left the "social" platforms completely and haven't missed them at all!
I can predict very little about the future. All I can say with a modicum of certainty is that AI art and whatnot will have a moment, like synthpop did in the 80s. Then a backlash to all that overproduced stuff will come. After that it will come back but a) it will be one of many aesthetics; 2) it will primarily read as a style of the past more than of the future
Sounds about right. I’m definitely looking forward to the great little pockets of sub cultures that pop up with high outstanding value. Great post
Thank you, and yes I am really interested in "the Fediverse" for that same reason. Lots of little town squares that are more "social" than "media."
Great piece, very interesting (to humans)
😂 Thank you!
You are spot on in your conclusions. It looks like we have had similar experiences trying to discuss these topics with others.
Some thoughts for consideration:
If the whole premise of this more colorful dreck is better, more profitable dreck, can the massive volume of dreck and the basic state of AI break or make useless functions like search?
I posit that it already has.
After searching for images of fine art paintings, I was assailed by a deluge of AI crap. Further qualifiers like historical, classical, oil paintings , etc. didn’t change the result. I stopped after seeing ‘Formless Blob #2’ and odd colored cow paintings, along with a tasteless AI adaptation of ‘Lady with a Ferret’.
It seems every piece of digital art is Fine Art in our brave new world. Art history erased? This obfuscation is not just in images.
It appears that someone is using AI to actively obfuscate by generating low quality peer reviewed research papers and attributing them to unknown authors in 3rd world countries. Can one researcher even write 80 papers in 6 months —not to mention the actual research? That is a paper every 32 hours. It doesn’t stop media sources from quoting this accelerating mound of feces. If AI actually gets better, who will able to distinguish real research from unreal?
As for addiction, look up Raid Shadow Legends Kraken on YouTube. Can you believe people spend more than a large house payment each month on a gaming app? One Kraken spent $70k last year alone. Paying for pixels when you are assaulted by every casino trick to make you lust for that next hit of dopamine. It is legalized gambling with champion battles. This is not uncommon across lots of game types.
There is so much more, but this comment is long enough. Thanks for the great piece. It’s nice to know that someone else thinks about this too.
🧐🤔
"it’s likely the algorithmic media companies will find a similar “audience” willing to scroll computer-made “content” alone for hours too."
The sad future that awaits. But as you touch on in your conclusion, this could also be the straw that breaks the camel's back. One can only hope so.