Incoming Content Deluge

Incoming Content Deluge(animaomnium.github.io)

1 points by animaomnium 3 years ago | 2 comments

I don't really see how content generated by AI is going to impact our ability to communicate any more than human generated content does today.

The author even makes the point that there's more content on YouTube than any human could ever possibly consume. How is adding more really going to fundamentally change our shared experience?

You're still going to have content that is better than others, maybe because the model that wrote it is better or maybe sheer luck.

In either case that content will still be shared, will still go viral, will still be a shared reality about which we can talk with our friends.

Does the author really believe that everyone is just going to go off into their own corner and consume their own custom tailored content, never desiring to share that experience with others? We will still crave shared experience and human contact.

animaomnium 3 years ago | |

Thanks for taking a read! Indeed, the argument presented in most of the article is refuted using a similar argument to your own at the end:

> Unlike GPT, as people, we all share the reality of human experience. This is a reality that can’t be generated: it is a vocabulary we all share. I hope that the fundamental human need for real social connection—outside of the hollow digital realities we define—will drive people to seek more real-world friendships than the number of digital ones they prompt into existence. When they do, I hope that these friends look to expand the overlap between their respective vocabularies, working towards bridging the gap between their shared realities.

> This argument presented in this post has at least one fatal flaw (among many): it assumes that the path of “getting lost in a private fractured reality” is the path most people will elect to follow. In practice, however, I think the novelty will soon wear off: most people will get sick of said Content Deluge after a while. There are only so many procedurally generated landscapes the eyes can handle before the body wants to step away and experience real nature. The curse of those forced to inhabit a fractured reality will likely be relegated to those who consider themselves members of the Eternally Online. I am grateful to not be counted among their ranks.

To respond to a few particular points you mentioned:

> [...] more content on YouTube than any human could ever possibly consume. How is adding more really going to fundamentally change our shared experience?

Point 3 mentions that we already face this problem; the content deluge on YouTube and similar platforms has already fundamentally changed our shared experience.

> [...] that content will still be shared, will still go viral, will still be a shared reality about which we can talk with our friends.

The content that is likely to go viral will likely be engineered to be so, ehibiting biases induced by algorithms for generation or algorithms for selection. These algorithms are likely to maximize some proxy of a metric for profit, such as attention, as expressed in the following (admittedly easy to miss) line:

> The shared plains of collective consciousness [will be] ravaged by a sea of memetic tofu, each thought allocated to the highest bidder.

I guess I fell prey to my own argument here, expressing an idea with a niche vocabulary, losing clarity in the process. I'll most likely revise this line for greater clarity, thanks!