#89 - Slop Streams

Remember the days when spam was our biggest online headache? Now, there’s a new nuisance: "slop ", or streams of AI-generated content cluttering the internet.

Shady companies are popping up everywhere, churning out this slop and striking deals with publishers who flood the web with low-quality product reviews to attract traffic.

Spammers and scammers are also exploiting AI-generated images to make waves on platforms like Facebook and TikTok.

Even Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai has acknowledged the issue in an interview this week : "Anytime there’s a transition, you get an explosion of new content, and AI is going to do that. So for us, we view this as the challenge." The search giant doesn’t just face new competition from ChatGPT and other upstarts. It also has to keep AI-powered SEO from damaging its results.

Platforms managed to curb the spam problem. Now they are facing the slop deluge. TikTok is fighting back by auto-labeling AI content and OpenAI is launching a tool to detect images generated by DALL-E . But it’s an ongoing game of whack-a-mole, with new tools emerging every day to bypass AI detectors.

AI

Microsoft's latest Work Trends Report reveals that 75% of knowledge workers globally are now using generative AI at work. Many are doing so without official approval, as 78% of AI users are secretly bringing their own AI tools to the workplace.

More work-related stats: According to a new SoA survey , 36% of translators have already lost work due to AI, and 43% report a decline in income because of AI.

Short:

• Meta's generative AI might get a boost from smart glasses and assistant features. Read more
• Meta introduces “AI studio” to allow creation of private and public chatbots. Read more
• Microsoft develops “MAI-1,” a new AI model, aiming to rival leaders like OpenAI and Google. Read more
• OpenAI is launching a Media Manager, letting creators opt out of data use for AI training. Read more
• OpenAI is said to be developing a search engine to compete with Google. Read more
• A16z shares tips on how to improve the retention of AI-products. Read more
• And a good summary piece by Rex Woodbury: Where are we 18 months after the launch of ChatGpt? And where does AI go from here?

NEWS

A leaked deck reveals how OpenAI is pitching publisher partnerships with a so-called "Preferred Publishers Program" . Key benefits outlined in the program include:

• Only available for "select high-quality editorial partners".
• Enhanced discovery and engagement with publisher content via ChatGPT.
• Priority placement and enriched brand expression in chat interactions.
• Prominent display of publishers' links.
• Financial incentives including fixed licensing payments and performance-based rewards.

Related: This week, Dotdash Meredith, one of the largest digital publishers in the U.S., inked a deal with OpenAI.

Toolkits is keeping track of the AI-deals with a dedicated database. And CJR sees media companies taking divergent paths on AI: deals vs legal action.

Short:

• Elon Musk’s plan for AI news doesn't involve any deals.
• Northwestern University presents a blueprint for evaluating AI in journalism.
• Madhav Chinnappa, former Director of News Ecosystem Development at Google shares his thoughts about the news ecosystem.
• Google's latest core update brings bad news for most news publishers.
• And Weathersight is a new set of tools that use Generative AI to enhance climate journalism.

AUDIO & VIDEO

YouTube is testing an AI feature that lets you “Jump Ahead” to the parts of a video most viewers typically skip to. Read more

AI movies are not yet ready, but the evolution cannot be ignored. Runway’s AI Film Festival grew from 300 submissions in 2023 to 3000+ submissions in 2024.

And Spotify has launched AI powered voice translation to translate podcasts episodes into alternate languages , all in the podcaster’s voice.

YOUNG

Character.AI attracts 3.5 million daily users, who typically spend two hours each day using or creating AI chatbots. Many of these users are teenagers. Over a million teens actively share their experiences with the chatbots on Reddit, discussing topics ranging from screen time competitions to preferring chatbots to real people.

Teenage gamers say video games help them build problem-solving skills, make friends and collaborate — but they also admit to problems like bad sleep habits and cyberbullying, a new Pew Research Center survey finds .

SHORT

• Meta's Oversight Board shares approaches to content moderation in an election year.
• Facebook’s referral traffic for publishers went down 50% in 12 months.
• TikTok published an overview of all the ways it allows monetization. Worth studying.
• Also: TikTok sues the US government over ban.
• GitHub Copilot Workspace lets you now code in plain English.
• Apple to unveil AI-enabled Safari browser.
• The Swiss public broadcaster is drastically reducing their activity via X.

IDEAS

Ben Evans considers the challenge of scale: Generative AI means things that were always possible at a small scale now become practical to automate at a massive scale. Sometimes a change in scale is a change in principle.

We live in a constant rush from one piece of information to the next, from one crisis to another; a paradox of present business that leaves no time for reflection. Byung-Chul Han, one of the most perceptive cultural theorists of contemporary society, calls this the crisis of narration.

And going out with even more reflection: what would a better internet look like?

That's it for now! I'm hitting pause on Wayfinder next week as I jet off for a cool long weekend in London with the family. No worries, though—I'll be back in action afterward.

Ezra