Talk at The Collective on Irresponsible AI

The Collective is bringing together creative & digital innovators, thought leaders & industry professionals from across the East Midlands to share, learn, connect, hatch plans & collaborate through a series of regular events & talks.

Professor Lars Erik Holmquist will give a talk at the next event:

Wednesday 9 October 2024, 1700-1930 at Belgrave Postgraduate Centre, Nottingham Trent University. 

Irresponsible AI: Why artists and creatives must take control of the means of generation

Generative artificial intelligence has quickly become an important tool in the creative industries. It is now possible to create high-quality text, images, music and even videos from just a simple text prompt. However, the most accessible AI models are currently firmly in the hands of a few very large companies in the tech industry, who are wary of any controverses that can affect their stock price. While safety and ethics are important, art thrives on uniqueness and breaking boundaries, and there is a danger that when the generative models are controlled and owned by a small number of actors, this will stifle creativity. In the worst case, it can lead to bland and generic outputs, and even become a form of pre-censorship. I will discuss how users of AI, in particular artists and creatives, need to take matters of technology in their own hands – in other words, take control of this means of generation.

BOOK HERE!

AI commentary on ITV news

Professor Lars Erik Holmquist appeared in an ITV television special on artificial intelligence and on ITV News on October 3. He talked about artificial intelligence and creativity, and how generative AI is already used in many creative fields such as music and filmmaking. But his prediction is that in the workplace, AI is only taking over "low-level" tasks like writing office memos and producing diagrams. For work that requires real human quality, AI is just another new tool that will help creatives to maximise their potential.

Watch the special on ITV below. The segment on creativity and AI starts at 11:30. There are also some nice views of NTU's new Design & Digital Arts building!

Commentary on Apple's AI announcements

Today, Professor Lars Erik Holmquist comments on the new announcements from Apple in The Conversation. 

It is anyone’s guess if Apple’s approach to AI will be able to claw back some of the lost stock price, not to mention the hundreds of billions invested by them and the rest of the tech industry. After all, AI still has amazing potential, but it may be time to slow down a bit, and take a moment to consider where it will actually be the most useful.

There is little in "Apple Intelligence" at the moment that will convince anyone to get a new phone, but some features point towards realising the research vision of ubiquitous and context-aware computing, such as the Hummingbird inter-personal awareness device (right) developed by us back in 1999!

Read the full article in The Conversation here:

AI probably isn’t the big smartphone selling point that Apple and other tech giants think it is.