AI, social media and future economy.

I'm really glad I jumped from CryptoTwitter to AI-Twitter. Since BTC and Hive are apparently only two real things there, the former became real cesspool. AI crowd brings to the table some freshness though. In the most of cases at least...

Recently, I came across a long-form tweet in which the author was ranting about how AI companies need to guard access to their technology, otherwise their business models and earnings are at risk of being compromised by other companies just fine-tuning their models. The author assumes that some companies will turn out to be profitable by guarding their secrets and maintaining a competitive advantage. The whole line of thinking here seems to belong to the 19th century!

I believe that hardly anyone, including myself, can fully convey how deep and profound the changes brought by the development of AI will be. Zero-margin cost intelligence will flood us all, and believing that some companies will be able to contain this wave through their legal or business teams is simply naive. Currently, hundreds of new AI tools are built and released every month, and growth is exponential. Graphic designers who were making fun of AI-generated hands will take another two months at most to process the newest Midjourney V5, which can create hands nearly perfectly. How long until AI can combine text and images? My bet is half a year or less. The thing is, AI is starting to achieve escape velocity. GPT-4 was exciting for two days, but we have another day, and we move forward. Reading your brain based on fMRI scans? This is already a thing of a distant past.

On of the cases to consider is the future of social media. In my recent Thread I shared my findings about the ease of generating an infinite number of pictures based on a very limited set of photographs. Soon, Web 2.0 will be full of artificially generated content, and if people consume these weird feeds, there will be another layer of information to process. Will people care if the content is genuine or not? How many people will just let themselves be immersed in the Matrix? How many already believe in the superficial, pleasant reality of social media? Instagram will either become an absolutely obsolete or a really weird place. Already a big chunk of content in Web 2.0 is driven by more or less professional business efforts. Competitive environment will be very AI friendly.

AI tools will only become cheaper and more widely accessible. If anything can be generated instantly with nearly zero margin cost, where is the place for extracting value? How can anyone imagine profiting from this scenario? What is even the point of money in a hyper-abundant society?

Intuitively, we tend to value whatever is scarce. Genuine, authentic human contact will become very unique in a fully generative Internet. Unique ideas, experiences, style, and point of view can be shared by each of us, humans. Following the paths of others and trying to fit in will be indistinguishable from AI-generated content. In 2023 it's harder and harder to find these Web 1.0, square-looking websites, this is how Web 2.0 will be seen in the future. Would you want to share your uniqueness submerged in a sea of generations? Highly dubious.

Naturally, a big chunk of humans will oppose this model and join some AI-free social media. However, without proper infrastructure, this will be an empty promise in the age of advanced AI. As I can't imagine feudal manufacture producing cars I can't imagine corporate social media and AI future. A combination of Web 3.0 solutions might provide a way, such as account ownership, a reputation system, disincentivizing AI content with community moderation, and earning money with genuine human experiences shared online. Can you guess where you can find these?

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