Flying pigs, flying chickens, and not realizing you’re dead
The weird world of Sora-ealism
Most people know OpenAI for its ChatGPT chatbot or its Dall-E image generation platform. However, you might have missed the underplayed but astonishing release of the company’s video AI platform Sora last month.
Whether you find the clips created by Sora impressive or not depends entirely on your expectations for video AI and your understanding of how movies, TV shows, and commercials are made.
From a technical standpoint, it is indeed incredible that a simple natural language prompt can produce videos that are this convincing. Some commenters on social media even predicted the end of Hollywood, without realizing that short clips which look fine on a phone are not equivalent to a well-written, acted, directed, and edited movie or show.
This is why I wrote a piece for The Generator when that first slew of Sora videos were released. I needed to explain the complexity of making long-form fiction for large screens and how Sora was not about to replace filmmakers. (With my degree in cinema, optioned screenplays, and previous career as a TV director, I believe I’m qualified to share my opinion on the subject.)
The article drew some feisty responses from readers who disagreed, and who, as of this week, are probably even more convinced that anyone with eyes and a pair of thumbs will be able to make a watchable feature film from the comfort of their couch well before the decade is over.
What happened this week, you ask? Sora took a giant leap. OpenAI revealed on Monday that they have “been working with visual artists, designers, creative directors, and filmmakers to learn how Sora might aid in their creative process.” The announcement showcases a collection of short films and videos that vary in style and duration. As far as I’m concerned, the most impressive of the bunch is by Toronto multimedia production company shy kids, whose one-minute film Air Head features a man with a balloon noggin living his odd life while we hear a first-person voice-over about this character’s unique situation.
Walter Woodman, the director of Air Head, commented: “As great as Sora is at generating things that appear real, what excites us is its ability to make things that are totally surreal. A new era of abstract expressionism.” He’s not wrong.
Paul Trillo, the director of a different Sora video, talked about how the platform is “bringing to life new and impossible ideas,” which is also a feature of surrealism.
As I noted in the mid-December issue of Discomfort Zone, surrealist esthetics are making a comeback due to generative AI image and video creation platforms. In that short piece, I asked the question, “Is it possible that the surrealist esthetic becomes this decade’s signature look in popular culture and advertising as AI-generated images and videos enter the mainstream?” Three months later, OpenAI’s Sora video platform is already making that prediction a reality.
Among the other new Sora videos is a charming trailer for a fictitious nature documentary called Beyond our Reality that showcases hyper-realistic hybrid creatures such as the girafflamingo, flying pigs, and the bunny armadillo. Director Don Allen III calls Sora’s “weirdness” its greatest strength because Sora isn’t “bound by traditional laws of physics or conventions of thought.”
What’s interesting about Allen’s comment is that filmmakers have never been bound by laws of physics or conventions of thought. It’s 120 years since Georges Méliès produced the world’s first sci-fi film, A Trip to the Moon. It seems to me that Sora isn’t about to replace either Hollywood blockbusters, indie movies, or Netflix drama series anytime soon, but it will give anyone who wants to make freaky films a new tool to play with.
And how about TV commercials? Nik Kleverov, CD at Emmy-nominated Los Angeles creative agency Native Foreign, says in the Sora post that he is using the tool “to visualize concepts and rapidly iterate on creative for brand partners.” Although I can see how Sora might be useful for visualizing concepts in the form of mood boards, it’s hard to imagine it producing an entire 30-second ad that will please a picky client. Anyone who has ever worked in an ad agency knows how demanding the creative process can be, since clients always have highly specific requirements.
Maybe we shouldn’t be surprised at Sora’s overriding surrealist esthetic. This movement has been hiding in plain sight for a while. After all, OpenAI’s Dall-E is named after the most successful surrealist of them all, Salvador Dali. I’m sure that his mustache would have perked up even more at the thought of using AI.
Chickens can fly!
Axios reports that Walmart, 7-11 and fast-food chain Chick-fil-A have partnered in a drone delivery pilot program (which, of course, is actually pilot-less by definition). Virginia startup DroneUp, which is partly owned by Walmart, thinks that it can solve the problem of food arriving warm when it should have been hot or cold by using a climate-controlled storage locker system.
These lockers act as a kind of hub so that barcoded food items can be tracked and stored before being flown to the customer or a different locker at a communal end-point, such as an apartment building or college campus, where the customer can unlock it using a code. It’s claimed that the system will save most of the labor costs associated with drone delivery, solving what is known as the “last mile problem”.
In related and more disturbing news, Chick-fil-A announced this week that it is breaking its “no antibiotics ever” promise because, well, what does a promise made by a corporation mean anyway, right? Fingers and wings crossed that we or our children don’t get ill (or worse) from antibiotic-resistant bacteria just so that regular chicken service can be maintained.
Spotify school semester starts
The world’s leading audio streaming service, Spotify, is launching a trial in the UK of online video courses. Driven by market research showing that users frequently seek out audio content centered around education or self-help, British subscribers will now see courses as a fourth category option in the app alongside songs, podcasts, and audiobooks.
Video-based lessons are available from BBC Maestro (a UK version of the Masterclass series), Skillshare, Thinkific, and PlayVirtuoso. According to The Verge, the platform is offering courses within four categories: Make music, Get creative, Learn business, and Healthy living, with non-paying subscribers gaining access to at least two free video lessons per course. Subsequent lessons will be available for a fee, with Spotify receiving a commission from the course providers. When you consider that the global online education market is projected to reach a value of US$600 billion by 2030, it makes financial sense for Spotify to test out its enormous content distribution network in this arena.
The first step towards FIFAI?
Anyone who knows me is well aware that I’m a huge fan of the English football club Liverpool FC. I’m also an avid follower of the latest AI news, as you know if you read this newsletter. So imagine my astonishment last week when I read that my beloved Reds are involved in a multi-year collaboration with Google’s DeepMind machine learning division. While Liverpool is not the only team to use advanced statistics to predict in-game situations and assess the potential of young players that they are considering signing, to my knowledge this partnership is the only one that involves artificial intelligence.
Machine learning is highly effective when it comes to pattern matching, which is why AI systems such as DeepMind’s AlphaGo have outperformed even the best humans, but soccer is far more random than Go or chess. One part of the world’s most popular sport that does lend itself to prediction, however, is the corner kick. Teams know that certain types of corner kicks threaten the goal more than others, and of course defensive players adjust accordingly. The DeepMind system, called TacticAI, generates a variety of different scenarios and rates the probability of player positions and movements for each one so that coaches can inspect the options and decide whether to apply new tactics in real-life game situations. It’s fair to say that soccer technology is more advanced than it used to be.
Sonia Thompson, Inclusive Brand Strategist
We are currently witnessing a backlash against corporate purpose. A TikTok representative speaking at SXSW 2024 reportedly told listeners that brands should stop making videos about their “purpose” because users think they aren’t being honest. At a time when greenwashing, pinkwashing, and sportswashing are rampant, who can blame people for being skeptical? Meanwhile, DEI initiatives are being blamed by conspiracy theorists and right-wing nuts for anything that goes wrong anywhere, including this week’s Baltimore Bridge collapse. It’s no surprise that people with power are afraid of losing it, but I believe diversity and inclusivity are a huge plus for any organization. Doing DEI right isn’t easy, though. So I talked to Sonia Thompson, an expert in the field, to learn some pro tips.
Q. What are the top three mistakes that well-meaning marketers and brand managers make when they want to produce a campaign that showcases inclusivity?
A. First mistake is just trying to force diversity in their campaigns through representation. Representation matters, and people need to see themselves and who they aspire to be reflected in the visual imagery brands put forth. But representation, or just including diverse imagery without actually doing anything to show you support and understand the community, just looks like you’re swapping out visuals with the expectation that that’s all you need to do to win a community over.
Another common mistake is not really taking the time to understand the underrepresented and underserved communities you are trying to reach. Cultural intelligence is critical to make people feel seen, supported, and like they belong with you. Invest time in going beyond the superficial, and act upon insights and knowledge that showcase that you really get the community at large, and you care about their wellbeing and seeing them thrive – beyond just your desire to have them buy your product.
The third mistake well-meaning marketers and brand managers make is not taking the time to get their internal house in order by building an inclusive brand. Consumers will believe a brand is inclusive when it is inclusive not just in campaigns, but throughout the entire organization. They want to see diverse and representative teams, they want to know and see you live values that they share. They want you to work with diverse suppliers. And they want you to stand up for issues that are important to them and truly demonstrate you care about their community. Ultimately, consumers want you to not just produce inclusive campaigns, but to be inclusive as a part of everything you do.
Consumers want brands to be inclusive and to deliver inclusive campaigns. But they also don’t want brands to be lazy and put forth superficial and half-assed efforts to get their money. Consumers from underrepresented and underserved communities are used to being ignored by brands, and they can be a bit skeptical when brands suddenly come around and want to give them their attention.
It’s like when someone doesn’t invite you to their parties for years, and then one day they come around and extend an invitation. Finally getting the invitation doesn’t mean you’ll automatically want to attend. Brands shouldn’t feel entitled that just because they start delivering inclusive marketing, that underrepresented and underserved consumers will just be so flattered by the attention that they will automatically reward you with their loyalty.
Sonia Thompson is an inclusive marketing strategist, coach, consultant and founder of Thompson Media Group, where she helps companies grow by showing more customers they belong. She also writes columns for both Forbes and Inc. where she covers how belonging, inclusive marketing, and remarkable customer experiences fuel growth and customer loyalty. Sonia is also host of the Inclusion & Marketing podcast.
Die another day
There’s a growing concern about fake content produced by LLMs overwhelming the internet with synthetic websites and fake reviews. But we all know that fake news has been around for a while. What you might not know is that fake obituaries are a thing. The original obituary scam involved pretending to be a funeral parlor and cashing in on grieving relatives who wanted to buy flowers. The scam then evolved to use low-paid workers on “click farms” who would create online obits for minor celebrities and profit from ad views by visitors to those pages through Google searches.
Now (of course) AI has begun churning out untold numbers of fake obituaries that function as clickbait. In a twist that might soon become commonplace, people are beginning to read online reports of their own deaths! Google says that it is cracking down on these “obituary pirates” and other AI-generated search spam. I wouldn’t bet my life (or my fake death) on Google winning this fight.
Where do plants come from?
I suppose one answer would be The Garden of Eden. Another would be Florida, which isn’t quite the same thing. But if you’re an American with a ficus in your dining room or a jade plant in your kitchen, chances are it grew in the Sunshine State.
A podcast called The Economics of Everyday Things from the Freakonomics radio network features short episodes that fulfill your curiosity about things you didn’t even know you were curious about. The most recent episode looks into the house plant market, its history, and how it has blossomed in recent times.
Book news!
I have exciting news about my upcoming book release.
My new novel, 2084, is coming out in one month. If you enjoy reading on Kindle, you can pre-order it today (this gives my launch a huge boost, so I’m grateful if you do!), or wait until April 30 to order a paperback copy.
In the meantime, I’ve produced two book trailers and I’d love to know what you think.
Let me know which one is your fave at john@johnbdutton.com and please connect with me on LinkedIn if you haven’t already.