noticed that a lot of US influencers are selling out, because AI companies are spending a lot of money to massage the public to get them to swallow their products, and influencers looking for $$$ are re-orienting their content to be as pro-gen-AI/LLM/agentic AI as possible to get their share of the cut—whether it’s through sponsorships from AI companies or be part of the club. it creates an echo chamber where influencers copy each other’s strategies, and see other influencers promoting this and thinking they should do the same.
currently in NYC, but from Aus, and the creative community in Australia is much more skeptical around AI. there are real tradeoffs when you don’t have full control over the whole creative process & workflow, as well as full understanding of what you’re doing.
Here is such a flaw. one appeal of AI that is being promoted here too for example is that it’s faster for quick & easy throwaway results, such as those visual effects that Cole uses for her videos—faster when comparing it to actually learning how to achieve different VFX styles from scratch and then animating those VFX styles in video.
But if you were to make a full movie with this level of fidelity, gen AI is much more finicky & unreliable and multiple orders of magnitude more inefficient than actually having a team of real human beings working together to produce this result. People on social media who are fanatic about AI are saying it’s revolutionary for them, but they haven’t picked out the caveat that it’s only revolutionary if you need to make large volumes of mediocre content. If you need to make a full movie or full video game with a high level of polish, it’s not gonna cut it for you when it comes to quality and granular control, compared to actually learning the trade and making those effects from scratch, vs. fighting with AI through walls of text. genAI is actually pretty useless for this, but AI companies keep looking for ways to get you to spend money on their stuff even if it’s unreliable, hence the big payouts to influencers to create hype, even if unjustly-earned.
It applies to code & engineering too. A decade ago, all the best people in your life would have been telling you, “there are no shortcuts in life.” It’s still true. Remember this whenever you see AI companies paying yet another influencer to get you to fall for the hype.
totally hear you. there's a big argument of influencers selling out on AI here. cannot speak for others, but i do believe that less creatives are 'selling out' than people think.
In my own personal case, I've noticed a lot of people telling me who I am.
1. Not selling out. I made greater income as an independent influencer.
2. AI was a VFX artist (peek this full tutorial) before I used AI! I'm no poser. Neither do I think starting to do AI VFX takes away from the hand-made craft of VFX artists; my work is simply valued differently.
3. Gen AI is finnicky. That is precisely why craft remains craft.
I think there are better stories to tell. We have AI for AI slop which is the commercial incentive a lot of users have; on the other hand, we have it being used to understand the universe.
I think I understand your nuanced thoughts on Ai. Tho do correct me if I'm wrong please.
The problem is, there's a big difference in the types of AI, there's one in which people coded and programmed to do very specific things to help with their work flow to make mundane tasks easier, as long as It followed the vision of the creators, it's okay. Then there's the recent generative AI boom in which it learns (steals and plagiarize) other artists to also help with mundane tasks or even do the WHOLE task, as in making the whole project.
It defeats the whole purpose of art. That type of AI should never be in the creative field or the arts, in my opinion.
Think about it. When artists create art, it's beautiful, because it's unique to them, it's an expression of them. Now when you bring AI in the mix, where It steals the art and gets trained by it, whether it be drawings or photography or animation. It takes it and plagiarizes it from someone else.
Now to make my point a little clearer, what if an artist really loved Van Gogh, to the point that all they did was do studies of Van Gogh, and eventually they were able to make a piece that was very similar to Van Gogh. This is sad when I think about it. If a couple years pass by and people look at that same art, do you think people will say "oh cool it's a piece by (artist name)" or do you think they'll take a glimpse and say "oh cool a Van Gogh piece" (there's a big difference between this and inspiration/influence)
This is sad, because art is about YOU. Not someone else. It's an expression of the things you want to express.
So when a piece resembles someone else's, you are forgotten. You're not expressing yourself, you only think you are.
We don't need another Van Gogh. We need YOU.
How boring would art be... If everyone was Van Gogh.
That's why the new generative AI is not compatible with art. It will eventually converge to some thing that wouldn't be unique, wouldn't be human, wouldn't be art. Just....slop.
i completely agree. i think ai should rapidly improve on self expression not without.
art is unique - i'd push back on this and say all art is informed by past art. what really matters here is the intention of the artist to really express something true to them.
generative ai is converging into slop is a fair argument but one i believe is untrue; as intelligence gets better, it will be less 'sloppy'. however, people have always tried to push tools in the past to generate more revenue and its happening to ai, leading to a slop era.
how did you learn to edit? ik this is an impossible question but it is the biggest bottleneck for me to create visually engaging content, esp with creating visuals
it's a complex path full of contradictions - taking the fullest degree of interest and responsibility for it is brave and honest. i love your work and vision and am personally glad to see you trying every way to pour goodness into humanity's interaction with ai. good luck! go make something wonderful and give it back to the world
noticed that a lot of US influencers are selling out, because AI companies are spending a lot of money to massage the public to get them to swallow their products, and influencers looking for $$$ are re-orienting their content to be as pro-gen-AI/LLM/agentic AI as possible to get their share of the cut—whether it’s through sponsorships from AI companies or be part of the club. it creates an echo chamber where influencers copy each other’s strategies, and see other influencers promoting this and thinking they should do the same.
currently in NYC, but from Aus, and the creative community in Australia is much more skeptical around AI. there are real tradeoffs when you don’t have full control over the whole creative process & workflow, as well as full understanding of what you’re doing.
Here is such a flaw. one appeal of AI that is being promoted here too for example is that it’s faster for quick & easy throwaway results, such as those visual effects that Cole uses for her videos—faster when comparing it to actually learning how to achieve different VFX styles from scratch and then animating those VFX styles in video.
But if you were to make a full movie with this level of fidelity, gen AI is much more finicky & unreliable and multiple orders of magnitude more inefficient than actually having a team of real human beings working together to produce this result. People on social media who are fanatic about AI are saying it’s revolutionary for them, but they haven’t picked out the caveat that it’s only revolutionary if you need to make large volumes of mediocre content. If you need to make a full movie or full video game with a high level of polish, it’s not gonna cut it for you when it comes to quality and granular control, compared to actually learning the trade and making those effects from scratch, vs. fighting with AI through walls of text. genAI is actually pretty useless for this, but AI companies keep looking for ways to get you to spend money on their stuff even if it’s unreliable, hence the big payouts to influencers to create hype, even if unjustly-earned.
It applies to code & engineering too. A decade ago, all the best people in your life would have been telling you, “there are no shortcuts in life.” It’s still true. Remember this whenever you see AI companies paying yet another influencer to get you to fall for the hype.
hey hey!
totally hear you. there's a big argument of influencers selling out on AI here. cannot speak for others, but i do believe that less creatives are 'selling out' than people think.
In my own personal case, I've noticed a lot of people telling me who I am.
1. Not selling out. I made greater income as an independent influencer.
2. AI was a VFX artist (peek this full tutorial) before I used AI! I'm no poser. Neither do I think starting to do AI VFX takes away from the hand-made craft of VFX artists; my work is simply valued differently.
3. Gen AI is finnicky. That is precisely why craft remains craft.
I think there are better stories to tell. We have AI for AI slop which is the commercial incentive a lot of users have; on the other hand, we have it being used to understand the universe.
“for the past year, i have been learning what technology can offer an artist.
now, i want to see what i might offer in return.”
More of this please. We need to engage, not disengage.
thank you!
Awesome! Nice to see your space behind the videos. Have fun at OpenAI and maybe I’ll see you at DevDay in SF.
thank you! see you
excited to see where this next chapter takes you queen 🫶🏻
thank you jess!!
I think I understand your nuanced thoughts on Ai. Tho do correct me if I'm wrong please.
The problem is, there's a big difference in the types of AI, there's one in which people coded and programmed to do very specific things to help with their work flow to make mundane tasks easier, as long as It followed the vision of the creators, it's okay. Then there's the recent generative AI boom in which it learns (steals and plagiarize) other artists to also help with mundane tasks or even do the WHOLE task, as in making the whole project.
It defeats the whole purpose of art. That type of AI should never be in the creative field or the arts, in my opinion.
Think about it. When artists create art, it's beautiful, because it's unique to them, it's an expression of them. Now when you bring AI in the mix, where It steals the art and gets trained by it, whether it be drawings or photography or animation. It takes it and plagiarizes it from someone else.
Now to make my point a little clearer, what if an artist really loved Van Gogh, to the point that all they did was do studies of Van Gogh, and eventually they were able to make a piece that was very similar to Van Gogh. This is sad when I think about it. If a couple years pass by and people look at that same art, do you think people will say "oh cool it's a piece by (artist name)" or do you think they'll take a glimpse and say "oh cool a Van Gogh piece" (there's a big difference between this and inspiration/influence)
This is sad, because art is about YOU. Not someone else. It's an expression of the things you want to express.
So when a piece resembles someone else's, you are forgotten. You're not expressing yourself, you only think you are.
We don't need another Van Gogh. We need YOU.
How boring would art be... If everyone was Van Gogh.
That's why the new generative AI is not compatible with art. It will eventually converge to some thing that wouldn't be unique, wouldn't be human, wouldn't be art. Just....slop.
i completely agree. i think ai should rapidly improve on self expression not without.
art is unique - i'd push back on this and say all art is informed by past art. what really matters here is the intention of the artist to really express something true to them.
generative ai is converging into slop is a fair argument but one i believe is untrue; as intelligence gets better, it will be less 'sloppy'. however, people have always tried to push tools in the past to generate more revenue and its happening to ai, leading to a slop era.
how did you learn to edit? ik this is an impossible question but it is the biggest bottleneck for me to create visually engaging content, esp with creating visuals
Congrats!
it's a complex path full of contradictions - taking the fullest degree of interest and responsibility for it is brave and honest. i love your work and vision and am personally glad to see you trying every way to pour goodness into humanity's interaction with ai. good luck! go make something wonderful and give it back to the world
not embarrassed. be specific, state facts
I care about misalignment; one of my most recent videos was about mechinterp. Ai safety matters.