AI in Meta Land
Facebook wants to become a video game
Meta, the company behind Facebook and Instagram, has revealed plans to deploy millions of AI-generated “users” across its platforms…
The internet’s future could well shift towards explicit text-based role play…
A more concerning risk is the fear that AI-generated interactions could overshadow human communication, creating an internet dominated by fiction. That said, a more intentional approach to fiction might be preferable to current debates around “post-truth” and “disinformation” — imagine a world where we engage with fake content knowing it’s fake!
Freya India described this as dystopian,
infinite “simulated fictional characters”. You, alone, in a vast social network of AI bots.
I think we should treat a bot-saturated version of Facebook as an immersive video game. If you have read Neal Stephenson’s Snow Crash (which coined the term Metaverse), that is one concept. Robert Coover’s The Universal Baseball Association, Inc., J. Henry Waugh, Prop is another. Tyler Cowen’s conversation with Jonathan Swift is a third.
My point is that AI can be used to create immersive video games. And this may be a more powerful application than the research assistant or “agent” that many people are looking for in AI.
We already have immersive video games. With Large Language Models, these could be populated with more dynamic characters. Your child could learn about America’s Constitutional Convention by listening in on debates among AI versions of James Madison, Edmund Randolph, and Gouverneur Morris. Your child could join in the debate!
When I was a teenager, I played Avalon Hill war games, such as Gettysburg. These were played on a board, using cardboard counters to represent military units.
Adults participate in reenactments of that battle. With AI, you could play a Gettysburg game depicted on a screen, rather than on cardboard. Or you could participate in a reenactment on line.
I also liked to play Strat-o-Matic, which simulated major league baseball contests using cards representing the statistical properties of actual players with results determined by dice rolls. The next generation of sports simulation games, included Madden Football, used personal computers. Soon there came participatory games, on Wii and Playstation.
If Facebook becomes a place where people immerse themselves in games with AI bots, should that cause a moral panic? Yes, people might become addicted to these games. My parents thought that I was addicted to Strat-o-Matic. I survived.
When people interact with bots on social media, some of the interactions may be harmful. But will they be more harmful than the interactions that they have now with other people? I would bet that the interactions with bots will be less harmful.
We like immersive entertainment. As media evolve, the possibilities expand, and so far we seem to have adapted to this. AI could prove to be the next evolutionary step.
Katherine Dee warns,
what we are less prepared for is a world in which a substantial number of people knowingly choose fiction over reality.
My point is that we have been doing that for all of recorded history.
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"My point is that we have been doing that for all of recorded history."
And most likely all of unrecorded history.
I did NOT expect you to take that position. I liked it, even if I have no idea whether you are correct. ...ok, I'm inclined to agree but still, I really have no idea.