Dissimulated Man
In a recent email, Bryan Alexander (one of my co-hosts on the "Talking with machines" podcasts) shared a short video generated by one person using "AI."
The Colorless Man (Short Film) by Hashem Ai-Ghaili
Disoriented while wandering this 'uncanny valley', I only made it halfway through, during the 'late night' interview. Bryan mentioned this video again while talking about writing and blogging with Jim Groom on ReclaimTV, so I went back to finish watching the 'film.' I think it got slightly more interesting by going meta with the transition to the 'photoshop' startup's vision and workplace.
Another person in the email thread shared an interview with the creator. It seems to me that this Al-Ghaili interview was conducted/generated by a bot. Who can tell?
Superintelligence
Am the only one that was terminally distracted by the colourless clothes? Does the protagonist emit a desaturating force field? I love that the creator's (prompter's?) last name appears to start with "AI." I needed the thesaurus to identify the appropriate adjective to describe my reaction to this "short film": vapid.
But, this early use of these emergent technologies is impressive. And terrifying. I imagine younger people will eventually easily accept these (and much improved) machine generated media as 'real', despite their retrograde content based on the training data with all its inherent cultural and class biases and limitations.
I look to my friend @hypervisible (Dr. Chris Gilliard), and his research on digital redlining, to understand the bias and racism in the structure of digital technologies and the datasets they are trained on. He shared his current thinking in this recent "Talking with machines" podcast "Artificial Intelligence, Abolition, and Luxury Surveillance."
I hope people as talented as Harry Shearer start collaborating with people like creator/communicator Hashem Al-Ghaili , or other tech savvy artists. (I've been a fan of Harry for more than four decades and still regret that he didn't get the Eddie Haskell part in the original "Leave it to Beaver.") Harry has been writing and creating skits and music, doing many voices, and commenting on current events on his "Le Show" podcast, in addition to his work in film, television, and radio.
I doubt the radio and tv pioneers could have imagined the affordances of their inventions, like all of Harry's work. nor the personal computing pioneers imagining one person creating "The Colorless Man." I am looking forward, with trepidation, to the new art forms and works that will continue to emerge.
Bryan ended his chat with Jim Groom talking about how email seems more intimate than blogging or posting on social media, and the importance of appreciating our friends' attention. How we direct our attention has always shaped our experience of the world, it is crucial we are thoughtful in where we choose to spend our precious time.
I may have to use this remixed version of the Colorless Man's epitath as my own:
Loved by machines, misunderstood by people.
#blog4life #talkingwithmachines #technology