Jon Leighton, of Land Digital, explores the implications and benefits of Generative AI in a modern landscape.
“I’ll believe it when I see it!”
The notorious words of Mrs Jones, my Year 6 primary school teacher, when I gave her my completely legitimate excuse – I mean, reason – for why my homework hadn’t been completed on time.
“I’ll only half believe then!”, was the follow up, which felt slightly uncalled for at the time. I was 10, after all…
It was the beginning of the 90s. OK, technically it was the end of the 80s, but just writing that makes me feel old! Yet fast forward [number redacted] years, and Mrs Jones’ follow up has still stuck with me to this day, and in the current age, this turn of phrase has arguably never been more relevant.
I’m talking, of course, about AI – or Generative AI to be precise, which is a specific type of artificial intelligence capable of generating text, images, videos, and more using generative models.
I doubt this is the first time you’re hearing of Generative AI, or Gen AI as it’s often referred to by the cool kids in the industry. We’ve all seen the news stories about celebrity deep fakes, for example, or seen a clip of a world leader appearing to speak words that in reality they would never utter. Well, unless it was a video of a certain former president – that one was probably real.
If a little time is taken to evaluate the content, it’s possible to identify videos that have been created with some form of Gen AI. There might be some inconsistency in the pixels, for instance, or perhaps the audio falls out of sync. Sometimes, something just looks…off.
But the fact is we are all influenced by what we see. We inherently trust what we see “with our own two eyes”, and mixed with a healthy dose of gullibility where we want to believe what we’re shown, this quickly becomes a recipe for potential disaster.
Of course, manipulated content isn’t always as obvious as Alan Shearer declaring his love for Sunderland. Content can be ‘tweaked’ at a much subtler level, much like how a news outlet might re-angle a story to support a certain narrative.
By this I mean, the introduction of new mannerisms, tone, or even protracted pauses between sentences all have the ability to severely alter the way we perceive a person’s character. Not only does Gen AI give us the ability to customise and alter this in video content, but it also enables us to do it at scale.
So what’re the implications of this? Always the pessimists, our brains automatically go to how this could be used negatively, and there is certainly the possibility of abusing these new capabilities in a political capacity. But looking on the bright side of life (doo doo – doo-doo, doo-doo, doo-doo), there are also plenty of potential benefits.
Across the professional landscape, think of the opportunities this creates for employers to tailor video resources like learning and onboarding material. HR rep or L&D leads can leverage Gen AI to create subtly different versions of themselves, enabling them to
hyper-personalise the way they communicate information. And this is super-impactful in optimising employee engagement and understanding! You’d be surprised at just how effective even slight changes in delivery, facial expression and body language can be in how effectively you communicate a message to different age groups, learning types, and nationalities.
What we’re ultimately talking about here is target audiences and the ability to use nuance to target a specific segment or demographic – powerful stuff! And with great power comes great responsibility. But this is the internet we’re talking about. There’s going to be plenty of irresponsibility too.
Don’t be embarrassed if you fall for the latest celebrity smear campaign launched on TMZ’s socials (but definitely be embarrassed about following TMZ) – the manipulation of celebrity profiles for defamation or to spread a certain message looks set to be all the rage in the coming years.
Sure, the editing of content to spread a particular message is nothing new, but its effectiveness has varied over the years. With the introduction of Gen AI, however, this can now be turned into something incredibly powerful and operate on a level never seen before.
Tailored video messaging combined with real time data and insights is a somewhat intoxicating mix that I don’t think has yet been fully realised. Providing we approach with caution, I think that’s incredibly exciting!
So, how will we know if this starts to happen? Or perhaps we should be asking, will we know when this starts to happen?
The good news is that there are classification tools in development that support the identification of AI generated content, with major players like TikTok, YouTube, and Facebook/Instagram introducing measures such as labelling to help flag AI generated content to their users.
But these tools are still in their infancy, and as such we don’t know much about their effectiveness. Gen AI is also evolving at an unprecedented rate, which raises questions around the ability for classification tools to keep up.
The bad news is, that leaves us with our own eyes and ears. Just look at how we consume content today. Mindless scrolling combined with the sheer amount of content we consume each day means that it can very quickly become a case of quantity over quality.
And with these habits already firmly ingrained within us, what are the chances we take the time to stop and properly assess the source of each video before watching it? Chances are, the video won’t even have our full attention!
Never one to end on a sour note, let’s not brush over the amazing opportunities this all creates for marketing. With Generative AI, the possibilities are quite literally endless, with tools to optimise and personalise each stage of a marketing campaign cycle from start to finish. It’s no exaggeration to say Gen AI is ushering in a new dawn not just across the marketing landscape, but our entire digital ecosystem.
With the ability to artificially create messaging that is interpreted as authentic to the end user, we must move forward with both intrigue and caution.
After all, we’re about to enter the age of artificial authenticity – seemingly an oxymoron, but now very much a reality. I’m not sure Mrs Jones would’ve even half believed that!
