February 29, 2024
Generative AI is encroaching on all forms of social media – whether it’s post creation tools, text and image creators or chatbots – the very face of social media as we know it is transforming and may never be the same again. For better or for worse? The debate rages on.
All the major social players are adopting AI to help make user experience…easier? Or maybe, quicker? Hard to say – ‘more creative’ is a somewhat oxymoronic statement, which completely counters the ‘social’ element of what social media is. ‘Social’ relates to an interaction from a living entity – which AI is not. Although, its entire intelligence is built up from humans sharing information with it (legal issues here, which will probably become a big problem in the coming years).
Regardless, are we entering a place of no return? Here’s another sentence saying AI is growing at such a rapid rate – yes, we’ve all read it before – but there comes a point where it could swallow just about everything.
The concern of its impact on social is that the very thing that makes social accounts so impactful in their own special way – is the person or people running it. Everyone’s personality comes into play – and even if AI can be a suitable replacement for a short while – there is a limit to just how authentic content can appear to be. Text prompts and generative AI for images – none of it represents you or your brand, and surely that defeats the point of what we go onto social for.
By definition
Andrew Hutchinson recently posted on SocialMediaToday.com saying:
“Social media, by definition, is “social”, which involves humans interacting with other humans, sharing their own experiences, and the things that are filtering through their real human brains, in order to then feel more connected to the world around them. That’s been the universal value of the medium, building on books and movies in facilitating more understanding and connectedness, so we all feel less alone, and more engaged with the world around us.
How do bot updates help with that?”
For many of us at IF, this is a bang-on statement. But even if we look at the creative aspect – surely, it’s a novelty for the foreseeable. Creating something impressive (and yes, it’s very impressive some of the things generative AI produces) is only empowering to the user for a short time. Once social becomes awash with stunning imagery and video of equal measure, what separates us? How does a brand find its muse when the only solutions lack a unique feel?
When every video is cinematic in nature
When every image is filtered to the 100th degree
When every chatbot is obviously a chatbot
When every post is clearly from ChatGPT
Those in the AI field will argue that the tech will develop to allow people to create their own unique look and feel – but when all that is separating us is language via prompts – surely, we hit a wall pretty fast. There are only so many adjectives to describe things and there will be so much overlap, that many created images and videos will start to encroach on one another.
A reminder on creatives
Creatives are people. The human brain will have billions of ideas and variations of productions based on any single brief. Give fifty creatives the same brief, each output will look different. Give AI fifty different briefs to produce one image, and there is likely to be a lot of identical pictures. Turning artists and creative writers into ‘prompt engineers’ is an insulting way of telling very smart people that they’re better off typing things into a box than busting out the paint brushes and notepads. It’s stifling. It’s boring. It numbs the mind.
When there’s a lack of expression there’s a lack of creative identity. Brands are in danger of wandering into such a storm and not being able to turn away.
It’s worth reminding senior stakeholders of these consumer and B2B brands that they became hugely successful due to human intelligence and ideation. Their teams created the ad campaign that became a hit. They’re your lifeline when things get tough. Don’t forget them and don’t force them into a silo of typing descriptive text to produce an image because it’s quick.
The longer game reaps the biggest rewards and most importantly – validates us as human beings.
We can lean on AI – and we should – but it’s starting to encroach on expression, and if we lose that, what’s left? Do you have similar thoughts or concerns regarding creativity? Contact us today