"Are you thinking too slow and small in a great big fast world?" - Futurist Jim Carroll
Hollywood is the next to be faced with a dramatically challenged future - We are probably only years away, or less before we see an entire feature film created by AI - and it will be pretty darned good. So too are creative industries - advertising, marketing, branding. Content creation is also in the midst of a wild ride.
AI is having its way with many industries, and if you aren't prepared to accept the speed, complexity, and reality of the change that is underway, you'll certainly have a rather unpleasant time of it. And it's not as if jobs are disappearing - it's the fact that dramatically different jobs are emerging. Of folks who know how to use the machine.....
Did you see the Toys "R" Us video commercial that was entirely created with Sora, the new text-to-video tool from OpenAI? There is a teaser on YouTube here:
You can find the full video over at Toysrus.com/studios At just over a minute long, it's not much longer than the preview, but is certainly a harbinger of what is yet to come.
People have a hard time accepting that their industry as they know it is disappearing - or disruptively evolving in such a way the way they work now has changed forever. Today's era is very much like what happened with the arrival of CGI in the industry in the mid-80s. Suddenly, all bets were out the window. If you don't believe me, watch the documentary about Industrial Light & Magic, and how Hollywood was suddenly forever changed in but an instant. Oh, it's on Netflix. Remember when we had regular TV?
Acceptance of change? I remember telling music industry executives back in 1995 that their business model of selling CDs, full-length albums, and big fat profit margins was doomed. Somewhere in my video vault, I've got a video where I'm on a national TV program and I'm being aggressively condemned by a senior industry executive - who at the same time was telling me that my ideas of a digital music industry were too far-fetched to be reality.
Are you thinking too small in a great big world?
Even text-to-music AI tools are moving at an astonishing speed, offering up AI-generated tunes in a matter of seconds. Today's quote? I fed it into Suno.AI, a great little tool - with the thought, let's have an AI write an Irish-punk-style song take today's quote, and put a little bit of reality on it. Why Irish punk? Why not - I was in Dublin last week! This is what I got.
If you don't understand how quickly creative industries are changing, you need to tune out today and drop into tomorrow. Last week, for the fun of it, I had another little Irish punk tune written for the kind folks at KPMG who had me in Dublin last week. Great tune!
Get with the program by getting with speed! For my last bit, I went with this, asking Suno to write an inspirational little song.
A 90s trance style tune about why the best way to align yourself to an era of accelerating change is to sign up for Futurist Jim Carroll's Daily Inspiration post, which features insight on trends
And in an instant, look - there's a song for that! It's got great lyrics.
[Verse]
In a world that's racing faster
Change is spinning like a dancer
Find your peace in daily insight
Jim Carroll's words light the night
[Verse 2]
Trends are moving oh so swiftly
Future's calling can't stay still
Subscribe now to find your guide
Inspiration side by side
[Chorus]
Align yourself don't miss a beat
Future trends beneath your feet
Daily dose of insight pure
Jim Carroll's posts the cure
[Verse 3]
Every morning find your path
Guidance through the aftermath
Let's embrace the change ahead
With his wisdom be well-read
[Chorus]
Align yourself don't miss a beat
Future trends beneath your feet
Daily dose of insight pure
Jim Carroll's posts the cure
[Bridge]
Don't get lost in all the noise
Tune in to the latest voice
Wake up to the future clear
With ideas that you hold dear
I don't know if all of this is silly or stupid or annoying or worthless. I do know we live in an era of creative magic. Scary, enlightening, imaginative, challenging, and evocative, all at the same time! And moving fast!
The thing is - this is not art. This is not going to instantly destroy millions of creative jobs.
But I can guarantee you that there are tens of thousands of people with creative jobs who are learning quickly how to use this stuff, and they are going to change everything!
Remember this - courage is the ability to accept that your current reality is being quickly replaced by a different one!
Futurist Jim Carroll has no creative arts skills but is fascinated by the new creative art skills that Ai is providing him.