The AI Easel

The medium is the message

I’ve made my feelings for AI quite clear in recent months. I don’t think it is without use, it is just not being used for the right reasons yet, and is, consequently, of dubious merit. That’s when it functions.

It is infuriating to see people buy into the sales pitch though. From small businesses, artists, and even Prime Ministers all saying it’s the future when it doesn’t even work properly yet, I do wonder why people are still so excited by it. It’s not even new. It’s just another algorithm but a much more powerful one that, consequently, draws on more power than some cities just to produce an unconvincing picture. But it’s when I say ‘unconvincing’ the die hard fans take issue. “It’s fooled competition judges”, they say. “You have to look really closely (usually at the hands)” they say. But I’m not so sure.

My manager at my old job wanted me to check some copy he had written that we were going to use for student tours. I read through it and told him he needed to do some editing to make it read less like ChatGPT. He seemed amazed I could tell it was AI. Later, in a conversation with a Lecturer at the same University, we discussed the investment in AI technology to read through student’s essays to check if AI had written it (similar software already exists to check for plagiarism). The lecturer pointed out it was a waste of money because if you just read the essays you can always tell. The imagery AI produces, even when the prompts are hyper specific and demand realism, are blatantly fake they just pass due to the constant wash of imagery that slides past our screens as we scroll. More than a glance reveals the falsity.

“But it’s getting better!” The supporters say as they point to another horrific video of snow folding into a road and body splitting into a bicycle. Even if it does get better it still won’t convince.

And why is that? I’ve expressed my thoughts on this but something that occurred to me recently was about the format with which we experience AI. It is entirely online. I’ve written before about how humans have been forced to ‘outsource experience’, living life vicariously through their phone, even when they are in the same room as something worth experiencing. We film ourselves on holiday, post pictures of ourselves in art exhibits designed…