Won't anybody think of the children?

VR headset and a fleshlight.

The real Turing test

You can already hire dirt cheap nobody actors for your indie passion project by putting up a poster near any college with a liberal arts program. Or use a website. Hell, there are even carve outs to stay full union.

But if you have money to make a "real" movie? You have money to pay talent.

But this just seems like another way for the rich to keep more wealth for themselves.

Yup. Insert AlwaysHasBeen.meme here.

That last sentence alone has described the entire American business sector for the past 10 years or so

Seems like it could be like music production software becoming widely available. Now you don't need to get a drummer, a bass player etc. Together to make music, you can just make it at home on your computer. It enables lower level people to get off the ground as they now have the tools that the pros do, you want a saxophone but don't know anyone in town who can play or can't afford one, just use a synth that sounds like one. Once you get signed though and you have a label giving you studio time you might hire an actual saxophone player because it sounds better.

Same with movies, AI could be helpful in making small low/no budget indie movies, but I don't think it's at the same quality as real actors for big budget movies where people expect more, so maybe the wealthy studio execs won't benefit from it much right now.

If this agency normalizes AI actors for the big movie theatres it'll help the smaller ones too, IMO.

It's already happening that people are using AI to make the movies of their dreams (well, short form video, at any rate - The Adventures of Reemo Green is a recent example that comes to mind, I would dearly love to see a TV series of this guy). They don't need to use an AI actor agency, but they do have to face the "ew, AI!" Reaction to their work. If the big studios start doing it that'll make things easier for them.

Also acting (among other creative fields) is where you see most of the actual rags to riches stories, and the bourgeoisie really wants to kick the remaining ladders behind them.

For the same reason they are "needed" for flesh and blood humans.

Studios need to know who is and isn't worth even spending the time for an interview on, let alone filming. For a human this might be avoiding complete flakes that waste casting time or, theoretically, avoiding something like Joaquin Phoenix pulling out of a movie at the very last minute because it was too gay (allegedly).

For an AI? That is a model that has been vetted that it won't lead to immediate law suits because it is just Tom Cruise or that can be programmed to do what is needed. Sometimes you want a model that is like Keanu and became a gun nut after The Matrix and shoots 3 gun in his spare time. And sometimes you want that Korean Boy Band actor who is going to flinch every time a blank goes off because that is the character.

On the talent side? What role you "choose" can completely derail your career. We all love industry darlings like the Twilight kids or Jennifer Lawrence who can do both big budget leading roles AND pick some of the quirkiest and most interesting indie films. But pick the wrong quirky role and you are "that chick who sucked a guy off" or get typecast into action movies and so forth.

And that is doubly true for AI models and their handlers/trainers. Everyone pretends they can spot generative AI because there are six fingers on that hand. But the reality is that different underlying algorithms/models will have characteristics in terms of what training data they weight and so forth. So two "actresses" generated with the same toolset WILL have similarities if you obsess over it enough. And... it won't end well if Aki Ross 2.0's underlying model was also used to train Project Melodee 2.0 and people realize her face when she is eating that cake that represents the last vestiges of her innocence is REALLY similar to the face that Melodee make when she is doing DVDA.

At which point the agency helps to avoid situations where "Well... you are contracted and mr tarantino wants you to drive that car while he jacks it to your feet. And you wouldn't want to be problematic, would you?".

And the last part being, funny enough, collective bargaining. An individual is gonna have a hard time saying no to that rock star director. Whereas said director is going to think twice about taking advantage of someone if it means they might get blocklisted by the same org that represents Thom Cruz.

There are obviously a LOT of issues with "AI Actors" and... I wish I believed it wasn't going to be a thing within the next 5 years. But the idea of having talent agencies to act as intermediaries still makes a LOT of sense.

Probably used AI to write the article too.

Oh sweet child, don't let anyone ever tell you about fan fiction.

Does it creep anyone else out that the first “AI actress” they’re trying to sell is a very young woman?

Watching "The Substance" and thinking that it would be better as a Black Mirror episode.

This is a character who can’t say no, can’t lay down boundaries, can’t say something is unrealistic.

In fairness, if we took every pedophile on earth and slapped a GACHA game in front of them to occupy their horny energies indefinitely? I wouldn't hate the idea of alienating and commoditizing this particular corner of the population.

At the same time, there's definitely a Pete Hegseth tier mental disorder that comes out of being perpetually surrounded by women who can't/won't say no. Eventually, you're going to have people who immerse themselves in this video game put the device down and try to interact with the real world on the same terms.

She also can't physically interact with a real person.

Ai is really only good at creating young women because that's what 90% of headshots online are

Go browse image generation models up for download on https://civitai.com/. Even when you're not signed in, almost all the models are advertised with generated images of young looking women. And if you create an account and turn on not safe for work, it gets even worse because everything then becomes highly pornographic, because that's what people use the models for primarily.

That is what 95% of image/video generation is used for, creating porn for mostly young looking women.

So it makes sense that's what they're trying to sell here, not saying it's right or moral. Feeling creeped out is probably an appropriate response for many people

For me, I don't really care. Sex sells, that's how it's always been and will continue to be into the future.

Young + attractive + female = talented

CGI actors, too.

And stunt men, if you're going to depict a famous actor doing something dangerous it's false advertising to have someone else doing it for him.

We should probably ban makeup as well.

HA that's funny, not even the people behind the original Chinese curse probably thought such evil was even possible, or maybe they thought it would be funny?

Goddam I wish these were merely "interesting" times.

Sure they can. There have been animated characters next to live characters for decades.

Or the Hollywood accountants put out of work by Excel, or the film processing and printing technicians put out of work by digital cameras, the cel animators put out of work by various digital alternatives, and so forth.

Technology changes and the jobs available change with it. Looks like many actors are soon going to join the ranks of the lamplighters and buggy whip manufacturers. I don't see why their profession should get protections and exemptions from this process that nobody else gets.

Mickey Mouse is at least animated by real humans. They are in a way the actors that create the performance.

Check youtube shorts. Videos have filters now to make them look like AI. Kids on youtube are already brainwashed into thinking AI is fun. AI actors and models are like any other product. If you hype it enough kids will love it.

It's a very, very steep and slippery slope though.