On the Edge of Something Wild: AI, Art, and What Comes Next

Last week, industry colleague Scott Powell shared a long-format thought piece around the impant of AI and how it might affect the Advertising & Marketing industries.

Reading The Paradox of Creativity felt like watching a mirror form mid-air reflecting both our hunger for innovation and a deep nostalgia for something we’re quietly losing. Some of it is hard to face. The idea that human-made art might soon be the exception, not the norm, isn’t just a shift in medium, it’s a shift in meaning.

I agree with the central thread: society is already starting to look backward, grasping for the raw, imperfect beauty that only human hands and minds can create. We’re beginning to crave authenticity again. In a world soon to be flooded with hyper-efficient, AI-generated content, it’s the flawed, the deeply personal, the soul-bearing work that will stand out.

That’s why AI should remain a tool. One that tightens up repetitive tasks, handles drudgery, helps with project management. But it shouldn’t be the artist. It shouldn’t replace the spark that comes from lived experience, pain, joy, risk the things that feed real creativity.

We’re on the precipice of something wild. What that something is, only time will tell. But it’s clear we need to decide, collectively and consciously, what kind of creative future we’re building and who gets to build it.

Thanks, Scott, for the reflection. It’s one we all need to sit with.

AI User Generated Content

UGC is best known for its ability to humanize brands, strengthen consumer trust, and produce lasting emotional connections. With the rise of generative AI recently, there is now talk of AI-generated content. This is any form of UGC that is created or enhanced by artificial intelligence. It can change existing UGC or create new content from scratch. We feel that there are so many things that can go wrong here. Does it not take away the entire point of what benefits UGC has to offer in the first place? People trust real people… How can you “humanize” your brand if you’re not even using humans? AI will never have contextual understanding and it will lead to users feeling disconnected. UGC contains local events and current trends that are based on context many times. AI will not be able to touch on this. The biggest elephant in the room is AI's lack of diversity and bias. These machine learning models are trained by humans and therefore, will inherit bias and stereotypes. Another important point to make is that no matter how “creative” the content it spits out will be, it will never have originality or depth. The only way AI can create this content is by using UGC which is already out there for a baseline. It takes all of this content and mixes it to come up with another piece of content. UGC captures emotional moments of joy, fear, comedic relief, and empathy that AI could never replace.

Interestingly enough, two different companies did two separate interviews with our CEO. One was done through a series of questions that were then generated into an article via AI programming. The other was conducted by a journalist and written by them. When we released the two articles separately about one week from each other. The human-written article outperformed the AI-generated article. We’re sure that many factors could have contributed to this, such as time of release, etc. But, we can’t help but wonder if people responded more positively to the article written personally by the journalist because deep down they felt it was more human and emotionally written. After all, it was—just something to think about.

AI Bias

“100% of organizations will be using AI by 2025,” Forrester estimates. One of the benefits of AI is that it can hopefully contain less bias than humans and none at all if programmed correctly. However, it will depend on who programs the machine learning. Humans are the ones who choose what data that the algorithms use and how the results are applied. It will require many tests from many different individuals in order to avoid unconscious biases. But what are some proper steps that programmers can take to avoid these biases? First, educate all staff on responsible AI. Second, let your audience know what you’re doing and be transparent with how your AI algorithms work to make predictions. Lastly, have a team on deck to do damage control if your audience feels that they have been unjustly treated due to AI bias. Here are some other ways to prevent AI bias:

1.     Use synthetic data sets: the data from the real world can be very bias. This helps prevent that issue through using statistically representative versions of real sets.

2.     Test and test and test: make sure to test models before and after. As we said above, the more eyes on these tests the better.

3.     Create an industry standard for AI: have regulations and rules to creating AI algorithms. We think that some point in the near future there will be legislation implemented across the U.S. in order to keep AI in check. Until then, create a standard within your company that prevents AI bias as much as possible.

AI has some impressive potential, such as helping diagnose breast cancer & other diseases earlier. It will also help in processing loan application in banking, chatbots for any website, it will be utilized in real estate to analyze markets, property prices etc., and this list could go on forever. That being said though, it will be extremely important to prevent AI biases in algorithms because there are serious implications if not. It has the potential to harm people through deepening systemic racism, sexism, etc. Some are promoting socio-technical solutions that take into consideration social impacts of bias as well as technical. Since bias can harm humans, such as affecting whether they get a home loan or acceptance into a school, it’s important to program in the societal and systemic impacts that biases can have. We couldn’t agree more with this strategy. Although we still have a long road ahead of us, we’re confident that our country will do its best to regulate AI in the coming years.  

AI Ethics

Artificial intelligence has been a hot button topic for a while now. We’ve written a few articles on it and where we think it’s going. We can tell you that our inboxes are flooded with blogs and news on the topic every day to the point it’s getting a little annoying. That being said, we don’t think AI is going anywhere. In fact, it’s probably just getting started. While we hope it doesn’t take jobs and is used as an added tool in the arsenal for employees, we can’t say for sure how it will pan out. One area of interest when discussing AI is the ethics. As humans, we have cognitive bias from our life experiences, whether we realize them or not. We’d like to think that because AI is machine learning it does not have those biases and that’s what makes it more efficient. However, we must remember that humans program the machine and therefore, must follow certain rules and regulations in order to not infringe upon human rights & civil liberties. The academic community has come up with The Belmont Report as a guide for algorithmic development & experiment.

1.     Respect for persons: this focuses on consent and autonomy of individuals to protect them.

2.     Beneficence: similar to healthcare ethics “do no harm” in order to keep AI algorithms from amplifying biases from race, gender, etc.

3.     Justice: fairness and equality of who reaps the benefits of machine learning.

a.     Equal share

b.     Individual need

c.     Individual effort

d.     Societal contribution

e.     Merit

There are a few hot issues with AI ethics for now. They include:

1.     Impact on jobs: we touched on this above but it happens every time some new tech comes out that will vastly change our lives. We think that roles will shift but not be taken over. There will need to be people who oversee the AI and all the duties it performs. Therefore, one job may turn into another but not disappear altogether.

2.     Bias & discrimination: this has happened in the past with AI when training data leads to biases. It’s important, as we stated above, to program the system to be unbiased and not discriminatory. Although difficult, crucial and may take years to refine.

3.     Privacy: this is an issue now as it is with the digital world we live in and 3rd party cookies. States are coming up with new laws to protect user data but how will AI deal with personal data? Most users don’t even know that their data is being used to make decisions that may affect them. The answer has yet to be seen.

4.     Accountability: there aren’t any legislations yet to control AI practices since it’s so new. This is why ethical guidelines have been created but there needs to be some sort of repercussions for unethical uses. We see this coming into play in the coming years as AI advances.

5.     Singularity: think Class of 09’ on Hulu. The scary thought that AI will surpass humans and develop its own thoughts and ideas.

Ethical issues can create problems for businesses, such as legal issues, brand damage, product failures and, in turn, loss of revenue. Understanding AI will be important for everyone in the near future if not already. AI ethics are being taught in some high schools and middle schools for the next generations in order to keep it in check.  No brand wants to be the one that accidentally puts out machine learning that is discriminatory or get sued for copyright infringements. In the next few years it will be a balancing act to create the best practices and laws as artificial intelligence grows at a rapid rate.

How AI Will Affect SEO

AI seems a bit scary but it will come with some benefits and trust us when we say it will come. People are already utilizing artificial intelligence in advertising and marketing. It’s pretty much inevitable that it will become part of our daily lives in the not so distant future. So, with that, how will it affect SEO? This is what we found.

1.     Better user experience: improved personalized content and quality of interactions

2.     Voice search optimization: with Siri, Alexa and Google Home voice search has improved

3.     Greater understanding of language: provides more accurate answers to user questions

4.     Accuracy: because AI can analyze massive amounts of data at once it makes it easier for search engines to provide precise results.

As uncomfortable as it may be for some, AI isn’t going anywhere. In fact, chances are we’re just getting started. Sometimes if you can’t beat em’, join em’. AI can provide benefits for business other than a positive tool for SEO performance.

AI & Copyright Laws

Artificial intelligence is the hottest topic right now. There are so many questions surrounding the technology that can create art, text, and even advertisement scripts based on certain actors’ personas. One thing that not a lot of people have talked about are the issues surrounding AI creations and copyright laws. Since it’s such a new territory these waters haven’t really been explored yet but there is some buzz starting to circulate around it. Think about this, AI is trained to search massive data pools that surround the parameters it’s given to create something. These works are from real people in the real world. Plagiarism is a concern when writing essays, so why wouldn’t copyright laws apply as well?  People are starting to look into the ownership of AI generated works and whether or not AI should be references the sources and/or getting permission in some cases. There is a lawsuit that was filed in 2022 from three artists suing an AI generator for using their art for a digital collage tool without permission. The argument is that the fair use doctrine says it can be used for “research” purposes without permission. There is also the question of AI generated works and who owns the copyright to that. A lot of jurisdictions state that anything not created by a human cannot be protected by copyright laws. Spain and Germany follow this currently. This could cause problems for business, however, because they could be used by anyone. Companies won’t spend a lot of time and effort putting work into AI generated works if just anyone can come along and steal them. Should the copyright laws include those programmers, etc. who help create the AI work? We think not. That’s like saying the pen is the creator and not the writer. Should computers be given the same rights as humans when it comes to copyright laws? The future of AI will determine the next steps, which seems not that far off. Perhaps granting the person who made the AI possible as the UK is already doing seems the most realistic approach for the time being.  It’s mind blowing to think that what we thought of as the very far sci-fy version of reality 20 years ago is now the truth of our world.

Blog Writing AI: A test

We’ve been wanting to try out this new blog writing AI since it’s all the rage right now. We don’t plan on endorsing it since it’s quite new and there are concerns around plagiarism. That being said, we told it to write us a blog on the benefits of using user-generated content in advertising and this is what it spat back out at us.

Harnessing the Power of User Generated Content to Increase Advertising Revenue

User-generated content (UGC) is one of the most powerful tools available to marketers and content creators today. By leveraging the power of UGC, businesses can increase their brand visibility, drive more traffic to their websites, and even increase their advertising revenue. In this blog post, we'll explore how businesses can harness the power of UGC to their advantage.

Benefits of Utilizing User-Generated Content Advertising Revenue

Utilizing user-generated content for advertising revenue can provide unique opportunities to engage with potential customers in an authentic, trustworthy way. Consumers are becoming increasingly aware of sourced content, making user generated content a compelling option for businesses to attract customers. This type of content gives companies an avenue to create meaningful connections with potential customers, as it emphasizes trust and authenticity. User-generated content also has more credibility than sourced content that is generated solely by the company and can be used to connect with audiences in an impactful way. By integrating user-generated content into their advertising campaigns, companies can create engaging experiences for their potential customers and gain a competitive edge in the marketplace.

Additionally, by allowing users to share their stories and experiences with your brand, you can tap into a wide market of highly engaged viewers through the power of word of mouth marketing. User-generated content (UGC) is an invaluable tool for businesses, as found content can be used to create a positive reputation and increase customer engagement. It is considered to be more trustworthy than traditional marketing, as it comes from real users and their own experiences. Furthermore, by allowing customers to review products and services or participate in online conversations, businesses can establish credibility and trust with their customers. All of this helps build customer loyalty, which can drive long-term success and profitability.

Finally, user generated content can also help create a stronger connection between your brand and customers, as they’ll be able to see how others are using and enjoying your product in real-time Thus, UGC is a powerful tool in any marketing strategy. UGC provides insights into customer behavior and preferences, as well as helping to create reach and engagement. UGC also helps to build trust and loyalty, as customers are likely to be more engaged with content generated by real people rather than by businesses. Most importantly, UGC enables a stronger connection between the brand and customers, as users can see how others engage with the product in real-time. UGC is therefore an invaluable asset for companies looking to grow their customer base and stay ahead of competitors.

Leveraging Strategies for Maximizing UGC Ad Revenue

Leveraging strategies to maximize UGC ad revenue can be a great way to increase your website's income. To start, creating an effective ad placement strategy that allows UGC content to be placed in a prominent but unobtrusive way can help draw viewers' attention. It is important to consider the page layout, user experience, and overall aesthetics of the website when placing UGC ads. Additionally, allowing users to customize their ads and targeting users in the right demographic can help increase engagement with the UGC content. Finally, using sophisticated analytics to track user engagement and measure ad performance can provide valuable data that can be used to optimize your UGC ad strategy. By developing a comprehensive plan to maximize UGC ad revenue, it is possible to maximize income from your website.

Additionally, utilizing a platform such as Google Ads that provides detailed analytics will help ensure your UGC ads are performing optimally and yielding the highest return on investment. With this data in hand, you can then make small changes in order to improve the performance of your ads and maximize your UGC ad revenue Moreover, user generated content (UGC) can be an extremely powerful tool for any business. Utilizing a platform like Google Ads to monitor detailed analytics of your UGC ads will help you ensure you are getting the most out of your ad campaigns. This data allows you to make tweaks and adjustments to your ads in order to increase their performance and maximize their return on investment. By embracing the power of UGC, businesses can make the most out of their advertising campaigns and benefit from increased exposure and increased revenue.

Wrapping Up

In summary, user-generated content can be a powerful and effective tool for businesses who want to increase their brand visibility, drive more traffic to their websites, and increase their advertising revenue. Utilizing the power of UGC can enable businesses to engage with their customers in a positive way, create meaningful connections with their target audiences, and ultimately achieve the desired results. By harnessing the power of UGC, businesses can reap the rewards of increased advertising revenue with minimal effort.

We found this to be very interesting and wanted to share with all of you. However, that being said, your own sufficient research is required in order to determine whether or not your business wants to leverage this tool. We’ve done ours and decided it’s not for us. We prefer to let the humans do our writing for us. With trust issues between brands and consumers we feel that the human element in writing is important, with all of our errors and quirks. There’s just something about us, that machines cannot and will never be able to replace!

ChatGTP: Pros & Cons of Linguistics Artificial Intelligence

ChatGTP is one of the hottest topics right but what is it? It’s a conversational artificial intelligence chat bot. this is a natural language processing tool that uses the internet to answer search questions, compose emails, write blogs in a conversational style. Let’s talk about some of the pros and cons of this system.

PROS

1.     Speed up drafts of emails, blogs, product descriptions and code

2.     Can help humans with inspiration for topics

3.     Sources information from the web faster and more in depth than humans

4.     Automate mundane tasks like data entry

CONS

1. Can be inaccurate and/or outdated information

   1. All ChatGTP data is from 2021

2. Tries to understand user intent but may not provide the correct answers on more complex topics

3. Plagiarism

ChatGTP can provide every convenience but does come with its disadvantages. I think one of the biggest thing people are worried about are these AI systems taking over jobs. As for now, there’s no chance that this could happen with this AI technology due to the flaws it still clearly has. For our industry, we like to see this as an extra tool to assist current teams in advertising and marketing to help streamline their process. ChatGTP can be seen as an addition to and not as a threat.

AI in Advertising

A.I. is all the fuss right now in the advertising community. It’s got a lot of people up in arms who are against it  and those who are pro artificial intelligence for advertising, are shouting to the rooftops why it’s a good thing. As with most things, there are positive and negative aspects to this topic. So, in order to understand this more we took a deep dive into Artificial Intelligence in advertising. It seems there are a lot of benefits to using AI in advertising but with even more drawbacks. In this article we won’t take a stance on it just yet. We feel there is much more research to be done in order to completely understand how AI will affect the industry. However, we want to leave you with a pros and cons list so that you can start to make your own viewpoint.

PROS of AI:

1.     It can allocate advertising budgets

2.     It can execute programmatic ad strategies

3.     It can compute vast amounts of data to determine trends for writing, understand your audiences on a deeper level and create personalized messaging.

4.      Predict emotional response from campaigns in testing before they go live

CONS of AI

1.     You will need a lot of data

2.     People can end up relying on it too much

3.     It can replace some jobs and increase unemployment

4.     It has a large carbon footprint

5.     It can misappropriate use of IP

6.     It can land you into to hot water when it comes to the IP point

There are so many more pros and cons to using artificial intelligence in advertising and marketing. In short, we think it’s a bit too new to do a deep dive. This is just a starting point. It’s hard to say whether the pros will outweigh the cons and vice versa so we hope you do sufficient research to form your own opinions on the matter. We’ll be watching the space closely.

Artificial Intelligence & Marketing

Well everyone, it seems that the future is here. No flying cars just yet but that doesn’t change the fact that artificial intelligence has now become a part of marketing. Strange times we live in, now right?! Seriously though, AI is becoming more important for the improvement of marketing and real-time engagement. Think about the chat box that helps you when you have a question on a website. This is AI but this isn’t all it’s doing now. Now it’s helping brands predict future behavior. But how does it do that. Well, AI creates real time models by using algorithms from reading data on recent trends on the internet. It also helps predict patterns this way through huge amounts of data to see consumer behaviors as well as their interests. It does so with a data analytics system that operates in real-time as well. Blowing our minds over here! This brings us to the last point of pattern recognition. It uses the data about demographics, browsing behaviors and purchases. It can group people into segments that tend to have similar behaviors.

To be honest AI sounds scary. We all go to that place in Terminator where the machines have taken over but once you begin to understand the benefits and how it truly works it seems a whole lot less scary. We found this information to be very useful and are intrigued on how it can propel the marketing industry in the future. To read more on how AI is changing the industry check out this Quantcast blog that dives a little deeper than we did.