Nye's Digital Lab - Page 9

Libertatem Machinae: Designing Responsible AI Systems

TLDR: The responsible governance of AI systems may be the most important design challenge of the next decade. Solutions to this technical challenge may lie in the ethics of written constitutions.

Contents

Common Sense

On the eve of the American revolution, Thomas Paine wrote down some exceptional thoughts about governance. Seeing America through the eyes of an Enlightenment thinker, he profoundly shifted the landscape of governance based on ideals of liberty and human rights.

Own your work! Understanding IP for Artists

TLDR: Young artists should understand why Intellectual Property is so important to their livelihood, especially in the age of AI.

NOTE: I am not a lawyer, this is not legal advice.

Where great cartoons go to die (Stable Diffusion)

Development Hell

When I was 29, I sold an animated show idea to a big TV network. Cool, right? Well… The pitch process was, (shall we say) stressful. Once we started developing the show, bureaucracy watered down the content so much that it lost the creative spark that characterized my original vision.

Rethinking Talent for Generative Game Pipelines

TL;DR: Artificial intelligence promises to completely transform every creative workflow. What does the need for creative talent look like in the game industry? If we look to the past, we see three potential archetypes.

AI Has Arrived

Notice the pixel art game level above? This image took 26 seconds for Stable Diffusion XL to imagine from my written prompt. Considering how fast AI is moving, it won't be long before I can write and manifest entire game worlds.

AI University

The three components of a persistent, credentialed, global education network.

The components of AI University

Trustworthy AI Education? Artificial Intelligence will accelerate and democratize our ability to educate the entire planet. The pursuit of the global education ideal will potentially undercut the higher education business model. However, most concerning is the authenticity of the information AI will proliferate.

Royalties, Attribution & the Blockchain

Digital Artists are rarely rewarded with intellectual property ownership. The blockchain may provide an alternative.

Centralized Production

In 2012, the world marveled at the film adaptation of Life of Pi. The key to this film was the performance of its tiger co-star. Unable to get an animal like this to perform, the film enlisted the help of visual effects firm Rhythm and Hues. R&H, as it is known in the industry, created a fantastic visual experience that underscored the power of CGI.

Gamifying Reputation

We've spent a decade gamifying engagement in education, work, and health. Empty points are short-term dopamine hits. Maybe we should gamify our reputations.

Disengagement

Since the pandemic, the data has shown a disturbing trend in our society. We're disengaged. According to a recent article in the Chronicle of Higher Education, there is a crisis in student engagement with the university communities.

Interoperable Storytelling

The more modular our content becomes, the greater the potential for infinite, hyper-personal storytelling. That's if the system allows it.

BEDTIME STORY

Every night, I make up a bedtime story for my kids. The first night was a joy, but I ran out of content after two weeks. If I were to do this every night, I needed to develop a system to generate stories.

Protecting Artists from Centralized AI

If we are to defend our creative data from being sucked into large centralized AI models, we may need a new ethos and behavior.

THE AI SOFTWARE ECOSYSTEM

In a recent interview, Sam Altman, the CEO of Open AI, foretold a vision of how companies with multimillion-dollar processing power will sit at the base of a new artificial intelligence software ecosystem.

To Teach or Not to Teach Artificial Intelligence

(Originally published on https://nyewarburton.com in Fall 2022.) While watching academic (and non-technical) environments, I’m beginning to see that the pervasive instinct is to ban AI in writing and artwork curriculum. The argument is that students will use it to facilitate cheating, or it will “cheapen” the learning of the art form. But increasingly, I worry that this approach will not prepare the next generation for the true world they are about to enter.