The reaction of creatives to AI: should we fight or bite?
Although most jobs are likely to be impacted by AI to a greater or lesser extent in the coming years, there is no doubt about the sector in which the most angst is currently generated.
Mosey through your LinkedIn feed and you’ll see people who work in the creative industries talking about pretty much nothing else.
The intellectual property issues are huge for artists, writers and musicians and I’ll return to those in future posts, but today I’m thinking of those working in areas of applied creativity such as advertising, marketing, movies, videography or gaming. In these sectors, generative AI hits hard.
I talk about this in more depth in my book AI and the redundant human (£8.99/$10.99/€10.99), but the essential conundrum can be summarised as follows:
Copywriters are competing against platforms that create plausible words out of nothing.
Graphic designers discover that anyone can produce a logo or revise a visual.
Photographers see their real-life work, featuring actual people and locations, swimming in sea of fake slop. Or they’re told that the next fashion shoot is going to involve AI models.
If you work in one of these roles - or a have a similar creative niche - it’s not uncommon to be freelance. And what that means is that if your work starts drying up, you’re not immediately economically inactive or claiming welfare payments, so the state might not even register your predicament.
Perhaps you start worrying about how you’re going to pay your bills. But if you take a regular job of some sort, you’re prevented from doing any assignments or projects that are still coming in. And you feel as if everything you’ve worked towards has been for nothing, which is a pretty dismal situation to find yourself in psychologically.
It’s a big worry for a lot of people right now. And there are two broad responses from creatives. One group expresses what I describe as a ‘fright and fight’ reaction, while another group bites - feeling they will only survive in the new world if they jump like a seal for the fresh AI fish everyone tells them is oh-so-tasty.
The people vowing never to use the likes of ChatGPT or Midjourney are easy to paint as Luddites. They claim that a machine can’t replace a human, as it lacks soul, imagination, empathy and context. They are almost certainly have a point, but they’re working in a world where few of their clients care too much about soul, imagination, empathy and context. In fact, those requesting the words, images, videos and graphics are often more motivated by issues like time and money.
Sure, a human can craft something that might be better than an AI. But the human says it will take two weeks. And then they have the temerity to send a bill. Let’s settle instead for stuff that’s FREE and NOW and GOOD ENOUGH. (My pal Michael Ohajuru, with whom I used to co-host a radio show, often reminds me of an old adage from his sales and marketing days: “I don’t want it perfect. I want it Friday.”)
With any technological innovation, there will always be people who hold out against the tide and they will always be swept away. I remember working at a London ad agency in the 90s, where there was an art director who refused to use a Mac, preferring instead some drawing and paste-up board. Let’s hope he’d stashed away enough money to retire before Steve Jobs so rudely intruded on his world.
Fighting is hopeless. Even opening up a Word document now, you’re confronted by Copilot asking you if you’re planning to write a letter to your aunt to congratulate her on her retirement or perhaps a flyer for cheese festival in Llandudno. Before long, there will be no escape from AI, because everything will be flipping AI.
Those who actively embrace the technology, however, can be as embarrassing as those who claim to eschew it. They tell us on LinkedIn that yes they do use it and they’re not in the slightest bit red-faced. After all, it’s just another tool. (It’s really not - see one of my earlier Substacks on this subject.)
AI keeps you on your toes, the enthusiasts opine. It can be great for ideas when you’re overloaded with work and up against a tight deadline. Or when you’re confronted with a lack of inspiration and a blank screen.
It’s amazing how these avowedly creative people survived prior to 2022, isn’t it? Perhaps if they couldn’t come up with any ideas or inspiration, they took to a ouija board? Or phoned a friend?
For what it’s worth, here’s my take.
If you use AI as a copywriter, designer or content creator, that’s fine by me. I certainly don’t sit in judgment. But don’t forget that no one pays you decent money just because you can write simple prompt in plain English or read through something written by ChatGPT and take out the em-dashes.
If you refuse to use AI as a copywriter, designer or content creator, that’s fine by me too. But don’t think that your personal avoidance of the technology will somehow stop its advance or that there will be a big market for your hand loom in the years ahead.
The bottom line is that there will be much less traditional human creative work around in the future - particularly in areas such as advertising and marketing. Some brands will still prize authenticity and originality, so there will be continuing work for people. But less work. And fewer people.
Sadly, it won’t matter whether you’ve embraced AI or you’ve rejected it, because the models will be working largely autonomously - or to the instructions of pretty much anyone from Andorra to Zimbabwe - and your personal relationship with the technology will be neither here nor there.
Marketers in many businesses will take in-house much of the activity currently handled by agencies and freelancers, interacting with platforms from big players such as Meta. They will describe their requirements for a campaign and everything from the media strategy and targeting through to the various creative executions and iterations will be handled by AI.
This technology heralds disruption that’s still almost unimaginable to those of us who have spent our lives in and around the creative sector. But the changes coming will pay no regard to your personal outlook or declarations of being ‘for’ or ‘against’ the tech. They will come for all.