Lights, Camera, Sora: Struggles for Some, Triumph for All?

Since its launch on 2/15/24, OpenAI’s new generative video tool, Sora, has generated nonstop buzz. Across the world, people have been stunned by the cinematic quality, realism, “camera” angles, and movement that Sora is capable of. AI's vulnerability to “hallucinations” means the details are not yet perfect, but it won’t be long before the average consumer isn’t able to tell the difference between AI and reality on their screen. This is going to make for a wild ride.

Right now, the loudest concerns about Sora are coming from the entertainment industry. Tyler Perry, for instance, has indefinitely paused an $800M project to expand his Atlanta, GA film studio due to Sora’s release. He was so stunned at the quality of Sora’s videos, that he expects he will no longer need to build sets or travel to locations for filming in the near future. While that appeals to him as a business owner, as an actor and filmmaker, he is deeply concerned for the film industry, stating, “Jobs are going to be lost.” And while it’s true that some industries will be forever changed, and some jobs will be rendered unnecessary, there will also be an abundance of creation, and the development of new jobs, as well as access to new paradigms that will benefit us all in incredible, unimaginable ways.

Picture this—every storyteller, every unknown creator out there without access to a film studio, suddenly armed with a tool like Sora to bring their visions to life, sharing their art with the world. What’s possible when people can communicate visually what previously only existed in their heads using text-based prompts is a complete game-changer! Disruption can certainly hurt, but it can also create innumerable opportunities. Before Netflix, the audience for foreign-language films was niche. Today, foreign language films are winning Best Picture Oscars, in part because of their widespread accessibility. Sometimes, what’s bad for certain industries can still be a net positive for the world.

Take real estate, for example. While AI can’t currently generate a video tour of an existing home, it can help bring imagination to life in renderings of new builds. As the CEO of a company with a media arm, I’m also interested in AI’s ability to generate b-roll and background imagery to minimize the need for extra hours and effort spent shooting on location. And for an everyday real estate agent, when Sora is coupled with script generation using programs like ChatGPT and voice cloning AI tools like ElevenLabs, you could foreseeably create high-end educational content in a fraction of the time it would currently take to shoot something similar. This is the sort of innovation we desperately need in the real estate industry as our lives have become overrun by endless tools demanding we keep our focus on screens rather than in the field with clients and communities where our efforts are best spent.

Of course, we can’t ignore that as a society, we face numerous vulnerabilities resulting from AI. Biases embedded in the models are a given, deepfake content is capable of defaming people and unfairly influencing public opinion, and there is no established method to spot real content from AI-generated materials.?

But here’s the thing–AI has no point of view or understanding of context; it’s us, together who are generating the data it depends upon to reason. We are the operators and have the collective responsibility to harness AI for good, and I see a million ways that we can do that. As the CEO of a company that is innovating in the AI space, our values are baked into every decision we make: We disrupt for good, never losing sight of the people and communities around us. We create for tomorrow, bringing the future to today. We amplify together in order to succeed together. We are, and will always be, relentless in pursuit of reaching our goals as tenacious seekers of knowledge.