Reality
In this 2nd edition of new series of curated news stories on current, relevant, and thought-provoking topics, we bring stories about AI as it changes our reality.
The First Bite: The Rise of AI in Reshaping Reality
Anyone with a social media account wants to be an influencer these days. Whether it is to promote a product or service, to build a fan following, or just to fill a self-satisfying ego-pleasing personal void for instant gratification. Influencer mania is all around us, and now we are seeing the rise of AI influencers stepping in to grab a piece of our already distracted minds.
Meet Aitana Lopez, Spain’s first AI-generated influencer model, a 25-year-old humanoid from Barcelona who will always stay young, frozen in time, while its 300k followers will grow old and die.
Aitana’s creator is a design agency, The Clueless, put naysayers at bay arguing that Aitana’s human-like persona is no different from its human counterparts, both flaunting their perfect lives and promoting beauty through sexuality.
“In the first month, we recognized that people are drawn to lives, not just images. Given Aitana isn’t a living being, we needed to infuse a touch of reality to establish a relatable connection with her audience. We had to weave a narrative,” explains her designer, Rubén Cruz, who is also the founder of the agency.
In reviewing Aitana’s instagram feeds, I struggled to separate real from fake. Some posts are of Aitana with her friends who I presume are also fake, or are they photoshopped collaborations with real influencers? My human eyes can’t comprehend what’s real anymore.
From a pure business sense, brands are going to flock to these AI humanoid-models. Many of them would rather not deal with the tantrums of real influencers. They can save cost. Their marketing campaigns are only limited by creativity. If it’s imaginable, it’s doable.
Once “hired,” they never tire, never complain, never seek a raise, and always follow company policy.
Today, Aitana earns more than about 11k Euros a month.
Let’s also meet Kenza Layli, Morocco’s first AI-generated virtual spirit, a traditional hijab-wearing Moroccan woman and ardent supporter of the Moroccan national football team. Kenza has 143k followers on Instagram and about 32k on TikTok. It posts photos and videos of daily life showcasing a love of traveling the world, working out, going to the movies, and spending quality with sister Zina and brother Mehdi, the perfect AI family.
What does this mean for a new generation growing up to this fake reality? How prepared are we to deal with the risks and fallouts? How will we hold the marketing departments who are brand-only focused to stay ethical and culturally adept? None of these questions have answers right now, and we are going to have to play catch up because we have let the AI revolution take off without checks and balances in place.
With social media already propagating distorted reality, hyper-idealized virtual influencers could exacerbate mental health issues. Evidence from Asia shows people growing emotionally attached to fictional characters, like having a virtual lover
The infiltration of AI into every aspect of our lives seems inevitable. There are obviously many benefits to using generative AI in our digital lives. I am already getting warmed up to AI assistants at work.
When I have a tech issue, I chat with a Tech Support Chatbot before I talk to a human support staff. I use Microsoft Copilot to summarize team conversations that I missed while I spelt. CEOs are already using AI tools to auto-create their presentation.
This is just the beginning. It is only a matter of time for Progressive’s Flo and StateFarm’s Jake to become immortalized AI avatars.
The sky is no longer the limit, our imagination is. That’s where the lines between truth and fiction, goals and ethics, good and bad, human and non-human, will start getting blurred and hazy. The only way we will be able to clearly see would be through AI vision goggles.
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Thanks for the read! The reality is what we make of our perception of the world. If I don’t come across Aitana and Kenza in my daily perception of reality, they won’t matter to me. That’s not to say that Kenza won’t matter to someone in say, sports marketing, because profession and reality intersect there. All this to say, I will choose to ignore these AI avatars and such till such a day when I am forced to—pretty low tech and true to nature kind of a person. For now anyway;)
I have seen videos of all the robots which do a lot of amazing gymnastics. I know no one who has ever seen these robots live. It makes you wonder if this isn’t just an Internet created character? 🤔