AI: Job Replacement Is Coming
During the writer's strike in Hollywood, I was laughing to myself at the absurdity of the union and the demands they were making. To me, this was the most ridiculous situation I have seen.
Bear in mind, I do not blame the union for trying to protect its members. That is what unions do. However, it is a fruitless proposition. At the time, I claimed that, no matter how things turned out, the writers would lose in the end.
While it is too early to tell how the writers are faring, it does appear the situation is becoming clearer for those who do acting work.
Actors are known for their voice roles. This is especially true with the explosion of animation over the past couple decades. Some of the biggest stars lent their voices to projects.
This is coming to an end. No, I am not stating this because the actors are presently on strike. Instead, the reason is the same thing that is going to affect the writers: artificial intelligence.
Keep Your Voice
This is a headline from decrypt where some are evidently upset that video game makers are turning away from paying actors for their voices.
As an alternative, these companies decided the quality of the AI generated voices is good enough for what they seek. This is a preview of things to come.
There is no reason to deal with human actors when computer software will get you what you need at a fraction of the cost. This is how technology works.
On a side note, my regular readers will recall how I discuss deflation. Many think it is a good thing. This is not the case. deflation shows up with people losing their jobs. This is a prime example. It is also why, being in an technological age, the idea of hyperinflation is absurd.
Technology, by its nature, is deflationary. For this reason, jobs are going to be lost. Voice actors are just the tip of the iceberg.
We are going to see the software take over all forms of entertainment. There is no way companies are going to deal with the personalities, quirks, and cost that comes with Hollywood actors. Perhaps some of the biggest names will survive but that is about it. Also, since the movie studios killed the star, this means almost all are going to lose.
White Collar Jobs Are Toast
In my view, white collar jobs are basically cooked. There is no way that this is going to end well for the workers.
At the core of this is the massive computational power the world has access to. Companies are creating massive networks that can train AI programs in a few months. What was novel back at the beginning of the Summer is now ancient history.
Today, we got the announcement of Gork, the new chatbot that is going on X. It is something that is already a step up from what was out there according to the early responses. Granted, it is an [alpha release with a small pool of invited users. However, this shows the pace which things operate. X.ai wasn't even in the game back in the Spring. They basically went from nothing to a product in 7 months (having all of Twitter's data helped).
How long until the ChatGPT and Bard move to another level? This is only going to accelerate as more companies get into the game.
Just think of all the people who sit at a computer all day tied to the cloud. These people are at risk of having the software replace them.
To me, it is obvious this is where things are heading. It might not be evident at this time but in another couple years, people will realize what is taking place.
Some will applaud the deflationary nature of these events, right up to the point where they are shown the door by their employers. It is, after all, what technology does.
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I keep thinking of a new usage for the term AI... Artificial Imagination!
That is a good one. People say there is no creativity with AI but what is creativity? Isnt it just rearranging previously known info in a new manner?
I think the AIs can be quite creative. Some of the solutions they can come up with are way outside the box. Especially in the realm of coding.
I never thought much about that second question but that sounds about right!
If they are not today, give it another couple years. We are seeing a great deal of advancement.
I agree but at the rate those advancements are occurring it could easily be 'in months' not 'years' that we see them.
Months will see some changes. It will be interesting to see what Elon has up his sleeve with Grok.
How fast will that advance?
I do not tune in to that fella's Kool Aid so I have no clue.
Ultimately it would be nice to see AI being decentralized but many of these mega-corporations are pushing for centralization much like what has been done with social media.
Maybe 'privatization' is a more apt term there but I am honestly unsure what term fits.
Yeah but as the article I just wrote this morning shows, even though in Web 3.0 love feeding the Web 2.0 beast. Their attention is spent on those platforms.
Agreed!
EDIT: I read that post also. Good stuff in it!
It is going to be interesting where this is all headed. I wonder if we could do the sensible thing and get a lot of these people that are losing work into doing restoration work of the whole country’s infrastructure? It’s not glamorous or ideal work but it’s better than being jobless. I know that what was traditionally known as white collar work is going to be phased out in a lot of areas. I don’t think the leaders care about the people at this point but the best way to bring this forward at a positive note is to guide and shift people over to infrastructure. Highly doubt that would happen for multiple reasons but it would make so much sense. If I get displaced, which hopefully I won’t but I know that I likely will to some extent, these things are going to be part of my options.
Good luck on that one. Do you think most people, especially in the West would demean themselves by doing manual labor or construction? Not that you arent wrong but look at the attitudes.
People dont even want to start at the bottom of a company. I doubt Hollywood writers would go into building roads.
As good as AI may seem, what they do is repeat, patterns, pre-established, I don't think they are as good as humans to put charisma and that touch of essence that makes us special to others.
Completely agree. Generative AI merely copies and combines. I think people will seek out real human creativity.
I don't disagree, but that's all a human mind does until it develops enough to be inspired to create something new. A.I. is still in its infancy. As the tech gets more sophisticated so will it's capacity to do more with the data it has.
Totally, most of what humans do is copy and combine... but every now and then someone has an idea that no one has ever thought of (or acted on) before that is completely original.
I don't have a huge understanding of GAI or LLMs, but given that it uses the data that it has, I'm not sure if it'll ever be able to produce unique and original concepts.
I think it's just a matter of time. Unique and original concepts don't come out of nowhere. They are just new ways of ordering known data. I wouldn't be surprised to see an artificial consciousness before I die.
Considering you're way too stubborn to ever allow this galaxy to continue without you, I think that's a pretty safe bet.
Even with just pre-established patterns, that covers a large percentage of tasks.
As with the voice actors, for now the technology is good enough for video games. That will likely progress.
Did you hear that the Hollywood writers got a great deal, pretty much everything they were asking for?
After the five-month strike, the writers got a three-year detail with increased royalties, mandatory staffing for writing rooms and protections from AI.
I would say that the writers absolutely won in this deal.
I think your points about actors is pretty key, although there are a few court cases, notably Scarlett Johansson suing a company that used AI and her likeness. It's happened to Tom Hanks and Mr Beast and I'm sure more and more lawsuits are coming... but I think that means that background actors and the smaller roles will probably be lost to AI.
The big problem is that if AI replaces the smaller jobs... then people can't learn the trade and it kills the pipeline... so we might not have any decent actors in 20 years because the pipeline collapse.
Personally I think that white collar jobs won't die, they'll just change. All our jobs will change to "AI troubleshooting" to resolve the weird problems it causes.
I think their claims are fair, all screenwriters should stand united because if they did nothing would be possible, disrespect and disregard for their work is not a working strategy, I'm a little scared that in a couple of years AI will develop so much that if it really starts to become a real threat to everyone.
AI is a very real concern.
I don't think it will produce better scripts or books or music than people, I'm not sure it will ever have real creativity... but I am worried that corporations will feel that AI is good enough and products will generally get worse and worse.
Who knows though? If AI is generating 1000 superhero movies a year, but everyone instead goes to see a small independent movie made by humans because it's really good, then corporations may learn what people want.
Today I don't think it will be able to fight with the creativity of a child because today AI is a baby in diapers, but in a couple of years we don't know where its development will go and it would be foolish for us to underestimate it, maybe in the future it will end up surprising us.
increased royalties, mandatory staffing for writing rooms and protections from AI.
Maybe. Most likely some will make more money while the rest will suffer.
As for the protection from AI, that is absurd. Do you think other companies care about what the writers are saying. Technology is global.
And as we know, disruption rarely happens within an industry. My forecast is that within 5 years, these people are cooked. There might be room for a select few but that is all.
Also keep in mind streaming is a major money loser for everyone but Netflix.
The writers protection against AI is contractual. The writers can use AI as much as they like, but the studios can't force them to use it to save resources.
Again the problem is the pipeline. Studios will always likely need some human writers, but if they try to save money by replacing all junior writers with AI then the studios eventually won't have any professional experienced writers.
Contract? Do you think technology cares about a contract? Or other companies?
I can also see some of those big names having to lease rights to allow software to use their voice, rather than paying them to show up for live reads. So, for example, Disney owns the rights to Dwayne Johnson's voice and can, not only stick whatever the Rock is cooking on anything for the next 5 years, they can dictate what the Rock cooks. By the time the next generation is old enough to have celebrities to follow, they'll all be A.I. generated. We'll probably also start seeing entertainers falling away while serious artist return to theater, if there's any demand for live performance left in a time when people can order up a customized experience for a fraction of the cost.
O.O this is nothing new tho ai was always going to remove jobs. its cheaper and easier to manage o.o than people
The next big improvements in chat AI might come from their introduction into RPGs. On top of regular chat bot you need:
Text-to-speech is already top notch. The accent, the tempo, pronunciation, general flow of speech is pretty much natural. While for some people seeing, let's say, Marlon Brando suddenly speaking Polish might trigger uncanny valley effect, it might happen mostly for older generation (and no amount of software improvement can fix a problem that lies in the listener's head). Voices of less known actors won't be a problem and for games and animations AI speech can already replace humans.
Finally images/videos. In my opinion current technology is in a bit of a blind alley. The AI "doesn't know" what's on the images it creates, it just matches text to images it have seen during training (with a healthy dose of mixing). Everything would instantly change if generation of image started from actual objects - a 3D model (with physics model for video) - and continued with adding specific filters on top of that. We would no longer see any of current blatant giveaways like people with seven fingers (we could still specifically request that, but in such case first step would add extra fingers to the 3D model first and also by default in place where you could expect them, unless explicitly told otherwise, and then continued from there). The problem with such approach is that there is limited amount of 3D and 4D data for training, especially compared to abundance of flat images and videos. Maybe full self driving will be a trigger in right direction as it requires AI to recognize and track objects in 4D.
I cant argue with your logic. It seems like you are following the trend lines in place. There can always be surprises but I think this is a decent framework to operate from.
The next 24 months should be interesting.
Yes, we really don't have anything assured regarding the future, but that's what seems to be coming.
While I agree that technology is deflationary, the main issue is that the profits generated from the deflationary technology are going into the hands of the few instead of being spread out among everyone in society to benefit. If there were some common sense regulations put in place to provide safety nets (or UBI) to populations whose jobs are going to be replaced by technology, that would alleviate a lot of the pain and stress these people face as their career alternatives dwindle.
Not everyone will be able to be retrained to be users of the new technology. That is fine, as the purpose of the tech is to replace the need for human labor. However, shareholders will have to start sharing some of the pie or conditions will go from bad to ugly quickly. I feel lucky that I am in a profession (education) that still benefits from a personal touch and the building of interpersonal relationships. But even in my 10 years in the classroom, I have seen huge shifts in how technology is leveraged in the modern classroom.
We saw it first-hand as classes went remote during the pandemic. Classes can be taught through the cloud, and I'm sure it is possible to leverage LLM to assist in instructions. I don't think it is possible to recreate the human element of building those relationships that are core to the educational experience. So much of the teaching experience isn't just the "book material" but rather the experience of how students learn and develop individual practices to aid them in retaining the learned information. Of course, in Middle School and High School, we also have social learning and emotional learning. It would be very difficult for LLM bots to aid in that development.
But if modern-day school is really the grounds for indoctrinating youth to abide by the business industrial complex, then maybe the controlling powers are less concerned with the students' emotional need and simply want them to fall in line. Only the future will tell!