In today’s issue:

  • Trump’s misinformation or parody?
  • AI and music the $4.5 billion opportunity
  • German immigrant AI tunes

Editor’s note: Today, we bring you a guest piece by Sam Volkering from his publication AI Collision which was first published on Tuesday 20 August.

You can hear from Sam more often at AI Collision and learn more about the latest developments in AI by simply clicking here to sign up for free.

And if you missed our live stream yesterday with Sam and Nick Hubble, you can now also check out a recording here. Don’t miss it!

Welcome to AI Collision 💥,

It was only last week that we wrote about the weird unfiltered use of Grok 2.0, the latest release of Elon Musk’s AI through his company xAI.

It was enabling people to post weird images of Donald Trump and Kalama Harris having a baby together and other WEIRD stuff.

And just 19 days ago, we posted the following:

When is parody, parody? And when is parody an intentional attempt as misinformation? It’s a fair conversation to have. You can use parody to great effect, and in fact it’s a staple of human civilisation. But also, some people hide behind parody for more sinister reasons. Where does the line exist? And who is (or isn’t) trying to really censor speech?

This was all about Elon Musk deciding to post a “parody” video of an AI-generated Kamala Harris “ad”.

And as we rightfully question, when is parody, parody? And when is it misinformation?

I get the feeling that people in high positions of power… let’s say a candidate for the US presidency perhaps… are abusing the leeway that parody and freedom of speech provides.

Take for instance the latest furore of Donald Trump’s campaign posting a series of images related to the most famous person on the face of the planet… Taylor Swift. Just take a look:

Source: Donald Trump via Truth Social

OK, so here’s the thing: the images are AI generated. And the caption suggests that Taylor Swift might be endorsing Trump.

That is implied, not explicitly stated. The reality is Taylor Swift is not endorsing Trump.

It’s probably safe to say that she despises him, based on historic comments such as those during the 2020 campaign:

“After stoking the fires of white supremacy and racism your entire presidency, you have the nerve to feign moral superiority before threatening violence? ‘When the looting starts the shooting starts’??? We will vote you out in November”

Most people, you’d hope would know that “I accept” comments and images were supposed to be taken in jest.

But at the same time, you just know it was used as a way to stir the pot and to push misinformation into the public domain.

Illegal? No. Dirty tactics? You bet.

The ease at which AI is now being used and deployed in a presidential campaign without repercussion should worry us.

In some instances, it’s an evolution of politicians just taking childish swipes at each other, like this one from DJT:

But we also know that sometimes these images are flying close to the line between piss-take and outright deception.

I feel that as we get closer and closer to November’s election, more of this is going to take shape and more of it is going to raise eyebrows and quite possibly the rule of law.

This is not to say these things should be outlawed. I’m all for a funny, satirical piece of content, particularly during an election. But as a boxing ref would say when a blow is below the belt, “Keep it up, KEEP IT UP.”

AI gone wild 🤪

I regularly keep tabs on news back in Australia. For one, it’s still an important part of the global economy, and of course it’s where I’m from.

Nonetheless, I saw just recently that some of Australia’s most popular and successful domestic musicians had been involved in a report looking at the impact of AI on the music industry.

A news article from the ABC about the report noted:

Some of the biggest names in Australian music believe artificial intelligence has a potentially devastating impact on the music industry and their incomes, according to a large-scale study of the topic.

“Potentially devastating”. Words that really sink it and make you think about the topic. To me, “devastating” means close to total and absolute destruction.

It’s not a big leap from devastating to destruction in my book.

But the question remains, is it really going to hit that hard?

If you’re so inclined, you can read the full 149-page report from the Australasian Performing Right Association and Australasian Mechanical Copyright Owners Society (APRA AMCOS) here.

One of the interesting takeaways from the report is the speedy growth in AI music.

APRA AMCOS estimates:

The music AI market is expected to grow more than tenfold by 2028, with a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of around 60%, to over AU$4.5bn.

I know AU$4.5 billion might not sound like much.

But that’s an example of an opportunity that’s gone from zero to multi-billions of dollars in the blink of an eye.

Five years ago, “AI music” wasn’t a thing. Now in the next few years, it’s going to be a multi-billion-dollar opportunity.

Putting aside the “human” side of music and music creation, that’s just hard numbers to help us understand that AI is not going away.

And it will impact the music industry, and it probably will cost people their jobs. But at the same time, this creative destruction will be creating new areas of opportunity worth billions and possibly trillions of dollars.

Here’s where things get a little wild.

You might think, “AI music, no one’s going to listen to that!”

If that’s the case, have a look at this from The Guardian this week,

A song about immigrants whose music, vocals and artwork were entirely generated using artificial intelligence has made the Top 50 most listened to songs in Germany, in what may be a first for a leading music market.

I mean, that’s really hitting all the controversial buzz topics for 2024 isn’t it!

If you want to hear the song (it’s certainly not to my taste!) you can do so here.

Is this a glimpse into our AI future? Does it all start with a German AI-generated song about immigrants?

Well, it’s a start at least…

Boomers & Busters 💰

AI and AI-related stocks moving and shaking up the markets this week. (All performance data below over the rolling week). [Figures correct at time of writing.]

Boom 📈

  • Veritone (NASDAQ:VERI) up 64%
  • Nvidia (NASDAQ:NVDA) up 17%
  • Appen Ltd (ASX:APX) up 39%

Bust 📉

  • Team Internet Group (LSE:TIG) down 23%
  • Amesite (NASDAQ:AMST) down 14%
  • Predictive Oncology (NASDAQ:POAI) down 5%

From the hive mind 🧠

  • This guy might be more important to the future of the world and AI than Bezos, Musk, Gates or any other major tech mogul. He’s a different cat, that’s for sure, but he’s also responsible for one of the most mysterious and fascinating companies on earth – PS The article looks to be free, but if it’s paywalled, let me know and I’ll post a better link.
  • In the 1800s chatting to yourself used to be a sign that you were fast track to a mental institution, then it became an annoying thing on trains thanks to ear pods and speakerphone. Now chatting to yourself is going to get annoying to a whole new level thanks to your phone being able to chat back.
  • I’ve been recently looking at the ancillary industries related to AI that are set for explosive growth. One of those written about recently has been memory. And it looks like Samsung, a relatively quiet player in AI so far, is taking an unexpected approach to where and who it gets its memory from.

Artificial Polltelligence 🗳️

Last week’s poll had a few comments and they were all fair and square.

The question we posed was, “I’ve compared AI to big tech mega trends before. But which do you think will be/has been more impactful on society?”

And here are the results:

The comments that came in – and why the internet has won this time around – argued without the internet, AI wouldn’t have much to work with.

To a point, yes.

But I also wonder, if the internet hadn’t become such a pervasive part of our lives, what would the impact of PCs be? Maybe we’d all still live in a digital world, with PCs at the core of every home. But instead of pulling on cloud infrastructure, maybe it’d all be locally hosted, at your home on your own servers.

And maybe you store and update your computer every month with some kind of data download you are sent in the mail.

A strange, and very different world, but not unrealistic. And to then leap from PCs to smartphone and AI, isn’t such a wild thing.

So perhaps the PC is more relevant to the rise of AI than the internet is.

Or the one thing that beats them all… electricity!

Weirdest AI image of the day

You’ve heard of elf on the shelf, now get ready for… – r/weirddallee

ChatGPT’s random quote of the day

“Every once in a while, a new technology, an old problem, and a big idea turn into an innovation.” – Dean Kamen, 2001

 

Thanks for reading, see you next time!

Sam Volkering
Editor-in-Chief, AI Collision

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