There was so much talk about AI last year. Fair to say it felt as though the industry had exhausted the subject. Also fair to observe that the industry felt it had conquered the subject. Has it? Impero creative director, Elliott Starr, begins this new year with a disquieting view of AI, or more accurately the industry’s confidence with AI. Here it is:
Let’s not beat around the bush, AI is the thing no one wants to talk about properly. What’s your response to it? After all, it’s not the strongest that survive, nor the most intelligent, but those most adaptable to change.
Many are pretending to be experts in AI. Most of these people are very much speaking out of the wrong orifice. Others have their heads in the sand. They’re just holding on for dear life it doesn’t replace them.
I just want to know what on earth is going to happen. Or at least try to get some grip on it.
AI is already ripping humans out of jobs. It’s “Corporate Ozempic” as Scott Galloway puts it, akin to the magical weight loss drug every celebrity is using but “no celebrity is using”.
Many companies are slyly laying off human intelligence while they seek to replace it with an artificial option.
The world’s smartest players of strategy games like Chess and Go [the 2,500-year-old strategy board game] are all artificial and have been for some time.
“By 2049, AI is predicted to be a billion times smarter (in everything) than the smartest human. To put this into perspective, your intelligence, in comparison to that machine, will be comparable to the intelligence of a fly in comparison to Einstein.
“The world’s reigning chess champion has been a machine since soon after computers invaded our lives. The world’s Jeopardy champion is IBM’s supercomputer, Watson. The world champion of Go is Google’s AlphaGo.
“Machines with incredible image recognition systems power our security systems simply because they see better than us, and the world’s safest driver by far is a self-driving car that not only sees further but pays undivided attention to the road.
“Using multiple sensor technologies for communication with other cars around it, it can even ‘see’ round corners. With enough ‘training’, no matter what the task, machines have been learning to do it better.” [Source: Scary Smart, by Mo Gawdat.]
Last year, OpenAI’s o3 achieved a 25% score on a new (and extremely challenging) FrontierMath benchmark — while previous leading AI models couldn’t get above 2%. That’s a 12-fold increase. o3 will be the most capable language model we’ve seen. [Source: 80,000 Hours.]
When I look at my own industry, huge networks and holding companies are dumping money into AI (and making sure people know about it).
They’re claiming they are all over it. But are they? Or are they just throwing cash at it to tick the innovation box?
Do their boots on the ground really understand it? Do their C-Suites and Leadership really understand it?
Do the teams marketers will work with know how this stuff works? I’m not convinced.
Marketing, like the rest of the world, is never going to be the same again. I’m not a fanatic. I’m a realistic optimist. Do you know how you stay optimistic in times like this? You sprint into the horizon of the change as fast as you can. You try to understand things as best as you can.
AI already has its fingertips on your lunch, and its palms are closing in. Consulting. Strategy. Creative. Production. It’s coming. It isn’t a joke, and it isn’t a fad. It is not kale smoothies or Clubhouse.
Is anyone actually talking about this? Or are we all just hoping if we ignore it, it will go away? Spoiler: it won’t.
If your team aren’t having serious conversations about it, they’re not just behind; they’re going to become irrelevant and obsolete.
I won’t claim to be an expert. I’ll endeavour to talk out of the appropriate orifice. I do not have all the answers. But over the last 18 months I’ve had lots of questions, and I know many others at Impero have, too.
I’ve built AI bots. I’ve obsessed over Midjourney, ChatGPT, and Perplexity. I’ve made AI movie trailers. I’ve even created an AI revival of Alan Watts.
I’ve seen what it does brilliantly. I’ve also seen where it overpromises and underdelivers, leaving you scrambling to fix things with good old-fashioned human ingenuity.
The speed at which AI and its capabilities are developing is exponential to the point of terrifying. It’s probably the biggest change we’ve experienced since the advent of the internet itself.
It’s impossible to ‘skate to where the puck is going to be’. But for now, as an advertiser, I feel I have a grip on it. A grip on what it does well, and what it doesn’t. A grip on how it can save businesses and marketers money, and where it will waste your time and leave you rushing to make things happen under pressure with humans. (Who are perturbed you tried it with AI in the first place.)
So, if you’re a marketer who is finding this all a bit overwhelming. Drop me a message on LinkedIn. We can try and find a time to speak.
I’ll do everything I can to answer your questions and if I can’t, I’ll point you to someone who can.
