0:00

ABC Listen, podcasts,

0:02

radio,

0:03

news, music and more. They

0:07

say Hollywood makes two kinds

0:09

of movies. Hero goes on

0:12

a journey or a stranger comes

0:14

to town. So

0:18

I got into background acting

0:21

just through the necessity of needing

0:24

work after COVID and

0:26

being based in LA. Steele

0:28

Saunders is that stranger and

0:31

he moved from Melbourne to LA to pursue

0:33

his dream of comedy and it's here

0:35

on set that his life takes

0:38

a weird turn. They were coming around

0:40

with the checklist saying, oh hey, this

0:42

week over the next three days everyone

0:45

has to go to the scanning truck

0:47

and get scanned.

0:48

The scanning truck. He

0:50

has no idea what

0:53

the studio representatives are talking

0:55

about. You would sort of ask,

0:58

oh, what's that for? And

1:00

they're like, oh, it's just if they need to change

1:03

anything. Now Steele

1:05

didn't like the sound of this scanning

1:07

truck, but he knew he didn't

1:10

want to piss off the bosses. So

1:12

he said, yeah, of course. Inside

1:15

the truck was a strange looking machine.

1:18

You're

1:18

in this very modern

1:21

computer setting, you know, three or 400

1:24

like tiny little cameras and you're on

1:26

this platform and then the platform

1:28

raises up on like hydraulics

1:30

or something. The 360 degree

1:33

array of cameras photographed every

1:36

inch of Steele and it created

1:38

a lifelike 3D model. Just

1:40

in a couple seconds, the platform

1:43

goes back down and you're done. And

1:45

then you walk out and go, oh, there's a lot of cool computers

1:47

in there. That was, that was

1:48

like kind of like admittedly

1:51

exciting to see it all. Steele

1:53

had just been digitally cloned.

1:56

His body double now existed inside

1:59

a computer.

1:59

Where it could be made to do anything

2:02

without him knowing. And just checking

2:04

Steel, you were wearing clothes at this point,

2:06

correct? I was very well dressed. Like,

2:09

if you're gonna get scanned, that's the outfit

2:11

to get scanned in. I'm gonna look fantastic for all eternity.

2:14

What was the studio doing, copying

2:17

and pasting actors, faces

2:19

and bodies?

2:21

The answer

2:22

would tear Hollywood apart and

2:24

change the future of movies and

2:26

TV.

2:28

A new stranger had come to town.

2:30

Its name was A.I.

2:37

Welcome to Hello AI Overlords,

2:40

a science fiction series about how AI

2:42

has burst into our lives in just

2:44

a few short years. I'm James Pertill.

2:48

By 2023, the excitement

2:50

in tech circles has finally spilled

2:52

over into the mainstream. Chat

2:54

GPT, image generators and

2:57

other powerful new tools are here.

3:00

I'm gonna introduce you to people who discover

3:02

that AI has infiltrated

3:04

their lives. And not always

3:06

for the better. This is a

3:09

story in three parts. The first

3:11

contact, then the backlash, then

3:14

acceptance. What happens when

3:16

the world wakes up to AI? Part

3:22

one, first contact.

3:24

It starts with Anna, another

3:26

background actor in Los Angeles. I

3:31

was brought on as a background

3:34

actor in a very large superhero

3:36

movie. It was a really great experience,

3:39

great director, great cast. And

3:41

just like in Alien Encounter

3:43

movies, Anna's first brush

3:46

with generative AI was kind of spooky

3:48

and strange. It was a weird day.

3:50

Like, to set the scene, there was weird

3:52

vibes. There were a lot of people from the studio

3:55

there, larger named producers,

3:57

some larger, you know, studio.

3:59

video types

4:01

that were on set and the vibes were kind of weird

4:03

that day.

4:03

And I should say, Anna is not

4:06

her real name. She's just a

4:08

bit nervous about annoying the studios

4:10

and breaching non-disclosure agreements. Anyway,

4:14

one day on set at the superhero movie,

4:16

she got this familiar tap on the

4:18

shoulder.

4:19

And they're like, hey, we have this really cool opportunity.

4:22

Would you be interested in doing something?

4:25

You know, the people

4:25

from the studio are here. We're

4:28

really interested in trying to capture

4:30

the best background that we have. I'm

4:32

so curious for someone that was like, sure,

4:35

I'll see what this is. So they lead Anna

4:37

through a maze of corridors and into

4:39

a secluded room. And

4:42

there it is, a scanning machine.

4:44

It

4:44

kind of looks like an MRI machine, but

4:47

like standing up.

4:47

Anna says the studio representatives

4:50

never mentioned digital clones. They

4:53

were very cagey about how the studio

4:56

would use the scan. It's like when they make

4:58

action figures, it's like, you know, video games.

5:00

It's cool. It's like, it's the thing that we do.

5:03

This is just like

5:03

a new way of doing it. And I'm

5:05

like, that's

5:07

interesting. So are we

5:09

getting paid more for this?

5:10

They said, nope, you will not

5:13

get paid more. I was

5:15

like, this feels wrong. Everything about this

5:17

feels wrong. I don't like this. I was like, hey,

5:19

I don't want to do this. And they're like, you really should

5:21

do it, though. And I was like, I'm good.

5:24

So Anna walks away. But

5:26

hundreds, maybe even thousands of friends

5:29

and colleagues, other background actors got

5:32

scanned. And then in

5:34

early 2023, a rumor starts

5:36

flying around Hollywood. The

5:39

studios plan to replace them with

5:41

scanned versions of themselves. AI

5:44

was taking their jobs. And

5:47

so they go on strike. One

5:49

day stronger. One day

5:51

more. It's

5:55

Hollywood's biggest shutdown in 40 years.

5:59

There's hundreds of actors on

6:02

the picket line. The entire

6:04

business model has been changed

6:07

by streaming, digital,

6:10

AI.

6:10

Even Fran Drescher

6:13

is there, who you might remember as the

6:15

nanny from the 90s sitcom The

6:17

Nanny. This is a moment of history

6:20

that is a moment of truth. She's

6:22

now the president of the Actors Union,

6:25

and she makes clear that actors from across

6:27

the United States are terrified.

6:30

Studios will use AI to replace them. We

6:32

are all going to be in jeopardy

6:35

of being replaced by machines and

6:38

big business. Now the studios

6:40

deny they

6:40

want to use digital clones to

6:42

replace actors, but

6:45

they also don't want to rule it out.

6:48

And this becomes a major sticking point

6:50

in negotiations with actors, and

6:52

the strike drags on. By

6:54

November, more than five months later,

6:57

actors are still negotiating with studios.

7:00

Of course at the moment if you walked on any set in

7:02

LA at the moment, it would be a very

7:05

lonely and dusty place. With

7:07

actors refusing to act, Hollywood

7:09

grinds to a halt. Which has

7:11

caused an unimaginable

7:14

ripple effect through Los

7:16

Angeles, because it's not just the

7:19

actors aren't working, it's the caterers

7:22

and the lighting people and

7:24

the cleaners. As the strike

7:26

drags on, many actors struggle

7:29

to make ends meet. But they

7:31

refuse to give up. They say their

7:33

future is at stake. I self-deprecatingly

7:37

say we're just cardboard cutouts

7:40

essentially. We're flesh-filled cardboard

7:42

cutouts. Of course the worry is that they're going

7:44

to take the flesh out and just use the

7:46

cutout. He still feels a sense

7:48

of hopelessness about AI. For

7:51

him it's not magical, it's

7:54

just another way of undercutting

7:56

workers. can

8:00

we get rid of humans? Yes. So

8:02

you know essentially this has been

8:04

taking place for you know since

8:07

the industrial era like how can we use

8:09

technology to put humans out

8:11

of work and that

8:13

to me is just like

8:16

really sad and and and just

8:18

like in society I always

8:20

wonder like what jobs are we going to leave

8:23

for the humans? After I spoke

8:25

with Steel the striking actors finally

8:27

reach a deal with the studios and

8:30

the deal includes some protections for

8:32

actors against AI including

8:34

paying them for use of their digital replica.

8:37

It's been a wild year for Hollywood, the scanning

8:39

trucks, the strike and now the deal

8:42

and this story is just one of many tales

8:44

of people encountering AI and

8:47

they all follow a similar pattern. People

8:49

learn that AI is more than a cute novelty,

8:52

more than a tool to write dumb poems or

8:55

generate silly images. It can be

8:57

used to undermine their livelihoods

9:00

and so we enter the next phase of

9:02

the world waking up to AI.

9:05

Part two,

9:06

the AI backlash. Imagine

9:10

you've spent years learning your

9:12

trade as a writer and finally

9:15

you've carved out a living as a published

9:17

author.

9:20

Meet Jane Friedman. She's a

9:22

human, Manhattan-based author. My

9:24

business which is you know a freelance business

9:27

really rides on my reputation

9:29

as a writer. Jane Friedman is

9:31

a big deal in the publishing world. She's

9:34

the author of a series of books on the business

9:37

being a writer and she gives a lot

9:39

of workshops on how to be successful.

9:42

My name gets shared a lot in the writing

9:44

and publishing community as a valuable

9:46

resource. This is someone you can trust

9:49

to get straight information.

9:50

So Jane

9:52

feels pretty safe in her work but

9:55

then one day in August

9:58

her life changes.

9:59

forever. I received an email from someone

10:03

who heard about a class I

10:05

was about to offer. This person

10:07

had gone on Amazon and they searched

10:10

for Jane's books. But some

10:12

of the books looked odd.

10:14

When she looked closer she realized

10:16

this all looks a little

10:17

strange, you know, her picture's not on it, her bio's

10:19

not on it, but her name's on it. So

10:22

Jane took a look and what she

10:24

found shocked her. There

10:26

were half a dozen books published

10:29

under her name that she

10:31

hadn't written

10:32

and they were for sale on Amazon.

10:35

And when she read further it was

10:37

obvious they were AI generated.

10:39

It was really repetitive,

10:42

generic, it wasn't

10:44

meaningful information. It

10:47

was the sort of thing to my

10:49

eye that looked like what you would generate

10:51

out of chat GPT which I've experimented

10:54

a lot with, being the curious person that I

10:56

am. Jane asked Amazon to

10:58

take the books down, but at first

11:01

the platform refused.

11:03

She feared the worst. Her

11:05

livelihood was built on her reputation

11:08

for being knowledgeable and trustworthy. Now

11:11

it might be drowned in a sea

11:13

of crappy AI content. The

11:16

books had her name on it. How

11:18

could people tell the difference between her

11:21

real books and the fake ones? Eventually

11:23

Amazon responded. I received

11:26

a message from their PR

11:28

person saying we're

11:31

looking into it, please be patient.

11:33

Then

11:35

when I got up the next morning, this is Tuesday,

11:39

most traces of the books were gone.

11:42

Getting the books removed was a win for

11:44

Jane.

11:45

But there was still the mystery of

11:47

how the AI was able to copy

11:50

her. Now we know that chat GPT

11:52

and other new writing tools are trained on

11:54

billions of words scraped from the internet

11:57

and from digital libraries of books. AI

12:03

companies generally don't say

12:05

which books and which websites they've

12:08

scraped, but Jane suspected

12:10

her website had been targeted. AI

12:13

writing tools seemed to know a lot

12:16

about her and her work, exactly

12:20

the information she'd published on

12:22

that website. How else would it know except

12:24

by doing a lot of scraping of

12:26

my website? But she didn't know

12:29

for sure. Then she

12:31

stumbled upon an article that seemed

12:33

to answer her question. The reporter

12:36

had unearthed a list of websites

12:38

that Google and Facebook use to train

12:40

their large language models. The first site

12:42

I put in was JaneFriedman.com. You

12:46

actually

12:46

have a ranking. It tells you

12:49

numerically how important

12:51

your site is in the grand scheme

12:54

of all of the grains of sand. And

12:56

I felt a little bit proud that my site

12:59

actually ranked relatively high.

13:02

This list explains how an AI

13:04

writing tool is able to produce

13:07

cheap and crappy knockoffs of Jane's

13:09

writing. But it also raises

13:11

more questions about the future of

13:13

her industry. I would say the authors

13:16

who are most at risk are the ones who

13:19

are already putting out low quality material

13:21

and they probably know that they're doing it.

13:24

Jane says AI isn't anywhere

13:26

near good enough to replace most human

13:28

authors at the moment. But

13:31

it is improving rapidly and

13:33

authors are getting worried. Amazon

13:36

has tightened its rules a little around

13:39

AI content

13:40

and Jane

13:41

has lawed up. I have actually

13:43

hired a law firm to prepare a trademark

13:46

application for me. Jane's taken

13:48

the unprecedented step of trademarking

13:51

her name. If someone is abusing

13:53

it, I really need to have immediate

13:56

remedies to stop the abuse. So

13:58

I was imagining. in the era

14:01

of AI that people could totally

14:04

create an entire website full

14:06

of Jane Friedman articles or create

14:09

videos or podcasts or courses

14:11

with the Jane Friedman name and then what would

14:13

I do? In less than a year, chat

14:16

GPT has changed publishing and

14:19

the backlash is here.

14:21

Authors are negotiating contracts so

14:23

a publisher can't use their books to

14:26

train an AI. And some

14:28

writers are suing open AI for

14:30

copyright infringement. They say

14:32

the maker of chat GPT stole

14:34

their voices. These are voices

14:37

they'd spent their lives crafting. Media

14:40

outlets like the ABC are

14:42

blocking open AI from scraping

14:44

data from their websites to train

14:47

future language models. So what's

14:49

the chance of this backlash slowing

14:52

big tech? Well

14:54

we don't know but it showed the world that

14:56

AI has a dark side

14:59

and that the AI utopia big

15:01

tech promised may

15:03

only be good for some people.

15:10

But the backlash isn't the full

15:13

picture. Many people find

15:15

the new AI tools really really

15:18

useful. Let's call this part

15:20

of the story the new reality.

15:27

I said at the start that Hollywood

15:29

makes

15:30

two kinds of movies. A

15:32

stranger comes to town and

15:34

a hero goes on a journey. Well

15:37

this is a story of a hero that goes

15:39

on a journey. And I'm

15:41

the hero if I do so myself.

15:44

Hello everyone. Thanks for having me. Intimidating

15:48

to look at this big classroom full

15:50

of you guys. I've talked my way into

15:52

a school in Perth to

15:55

interrogate the students one by

15:57

one. That's why I've come here today to kind of

15:59

find out for. you how you using

16:02

these new generative AI tools. And

16:05

I'm here to solve an important mystery

16:07

about 2023. But yeah this is like your

16:09

chance to kind of give a proper

16:12

insight into what the year has been like

16:14

for you. At the start of the year there

16:16

were big headlines about how chat GPT

16:19

would ruin education. Experts

16:21

said students would use AI to

16:24

cheat and then well

16:27

nothing. We never actually heard

16:29

if this happened. So

16:32

I'm here at the end of the year to finally

16:35

answer the question. I'm just going to interview

16:37

the small groups in the small room. How much

16:39

do students use chat GPT

16:42

to cheat? How does that sound? A

16:45

room full of teenagers stare back

16:47

at me in silence with barely

16:50

concealed contempt. Yeah

16:53

okay cool. I press on

16:56

with my mission to get to the truth.

16:58

Great well yeah here's the questions.

17:00

I come across Brody. He's in

17:02

year 11 and he's doing a ton of

17:05

hard subjects like physics, chemistry.

17:08

He looks me in the eye and he says he

17:11

isn't a cheater. Though he does use

17:13

chat GPT. I use a lot of

17:15

not just chat GPT but other sort of AI

17:18

tools for inspiration for certain projects.

17:20

So I might use AI

17:23

image tools to start

17:25

some design ideas for websites,

17:28

for characters, that sort of stuff. I turn

17:30

to Brody's friend Danny. He's been

17:32

watching the interrogation. Danny

17:35

doesn't look particularly nervous and

17:37

when I ask him if he uses AI to cheat at

17:40

school he confidently says

17:43

no. If you use chat GPT you'll have a like,

17:45

it's not cheating but you get a head start in

17:47

what the subject is going to be like, like the basic outlines

17:50

of it and sometimes I've seen people

17:52

use like, generate AI to like generate

17:54

photos for their PowerPoints. So two students

17:56

down and no cheating here.

17:58

I think they're telling the truth. But

18:01

I do have a big ABC microphone

18:03

and their teacher is just standing over

18:05

there So who knows? So

18:09

I lay my cards on the table and

18:11

I ask the class directly So how come

18:14

none of you guys use it to cheat? If

18:16

I'm not learning it then there's not much

18:18

point using it to cheat in class cheating

18:21

will just lead to More work in the future.

18:23

These are very mature answers. Do you

18:25

think they're widely held or are you

18:27

guys the exception? Probably while

18:29

already held because with asking before

18:31

this I've talked to many friends about it and they have

18:34

similar views Because the main is

18:36

that there's exams to it. You have to know

18:38

everything anyway, so it really doesn't matter

18:41

using AI or anything I'm

18:48

defeated by their academic

18:51

integrity Everyone said

18:53

the students were going to use chat GPT

18:55

to cheat during 2023 But

18:58

not a single student will admit to this

19:02

In the days that follow I

19:04

have a crisis of confidence

19:07

The hero goes on a journey But

19:10

the journey proves far harder

19:12

than they expected. I start to

19:14

question the very basis of my investigation What

19:18

is cheating? Where is the line

19:20

between getting chat GPT to

19:22

write your homework and Learning

19:25

how to use an important AI tool the

19:27

school may call it cheating But

19:30

an employer well, they might call

19:32

it innovation Then

19:35

I get a message. I've cast

19:38

the net wide to try and find

19:40

a student who cheats I've

19:42

been posting on study forums for

19:45

high school students around Australia And

19:48

my hard work starts paying off

19:51

I start getting voice messages in response

19:53

to my questions one arrives

19:55

from a year 11 students in Sydney

19:58

Krissula has

19:59

a a truly terrifying list

20:02

of subjects. My subjects this year are advanced

20:04

mathematics, advanced English,

20:05

ancient English, economics, modern great continuous,

20:08

hopefully, extension history. Chrisola

20:10

says at the start of 2023, she

20:13

was addicted to chat GPT,

20:16

and she was using it to help with

20:18

her homework.

20:19

It was especially useful for literary

20:21

analysis and providing quotes for things in

20:23

text.

20:24

Then she noticed she was doing

20:26

worth and assessments.

20:27

I noticed my critical and analytical thinking

20:30

was slightly impaired.

20:31

And she grew worried about how using

20:33

the tool was affecting her learning.

20:36

The daily use had formed a habit. So

20:38

Chrisola blocked chat GPT

20:41

on her computer, but she tells

20:43

me that her friends are still addicted

20:46

and maybe use it to cheat.

20:48

My friends used chat GPT constantly,

20:51

even handing in entire assessments written

20:53

entirely by the AI.

20:55

I knew I was getting close.

20:58

And then finally, I score

21:00

a hit. My hard-hitting investigation

21:03

of cheating in Australian schools pays

21:06

off. A year 12 student sends

21:08

the message I've been waiting for. I

21:11

can see the WA media award dangling

21:13

before me. I call him straight

21:15

away. I probably wouldn't want to use my

21:19

full real name. Yeah. Eric.

21:21

Eric's a good name. I like it, Eric. Eric

21:23

isn't his real name. He wants to be anonymous

21:26

for this interview. And it's soon

21:28

clear that Eric is here to spill

21:31

the beans. He tells me how

21:33

he began cheating. I went, well,

21:35

if this can spit out information this

21:37

fast, what's to say, it

21:39

couldn't do it for schoolwork. Early in

21:41

term one, Eric gave chat GPT

21:44

his geography assignment. So

21:46

I was sitting there and I was just watching it. And it's

21:48

just printing out all these lines, printing them out, printing

21:50

them out. And I'm going, wow. How

21:53

have we created something like this

21:56

as a species? And it's like a full

21:58

complex essay, just being.

22:00

And to do your screen in seconds is really

22:02

amazing thing.

22:03

Yeah, obviously you have that sort of joy

22:06

kick back when you're like, oh, no, I don't

22:08

have to do it. I've got it done. It's done now. So

22:11

just to be clear, did that count as cheating?

22:14

That would count as cheating. Yeah, I would assume

22:16

so. If it was called, I'd assume that would be

22:19

seen as cheating, but slipped

22:21

through fine. So, yeah, Eric cheated

22:23

on that geography assignment. Although for

22:26

essays that actually counted towards

22:28

his HSC, he says he didn't most

22:31

of the time use it to do his homework.

22:34

So around around 60% of

22:36

my homework was written by chat

22:39

JBT due to the fact that

22:42

I found it to be a lot

22:44

easier to do and give me more time. How

22:46

common is your story among the people

22:48

that you know? I would say you'd be

22:51

hard pressed to find a student that hasn't

22:53

used AI for at least something. Whether

22:56

that is just studying or an

22:58

assessment or a piece of homework, I think

23:01

it would be very difficult for you to find a student

23:03

that is sitting the HSC right now.

23:07

Eric says using chat JBT to do

23:10

most of his homework hasn't affected

23:12

his ability to learn. And

23:14

the reason he gives for this is that

23:17

homework is a waste of time. With

23:19

a lot of homework tasks, personally, I find

23:22

that they are instead of learning, it's

23:24

more regurgitating. Mission

23:28

complete. I say goodbye

23:30

to Eric. The hero staggers

23:32

to the end of his journey. Wary

23:35

but triumphant. A cheater

23:37

found. But of

23:39

course, this isn't all about cheating.

23:42

The reason I've told you these students' stories

23:44

is because I think it's important

23:47

to get to the nuance of how AI

23:49

can be used. At the start

23:51

of 2023, we had the usual

23:53

knee-jerk responses to a new technology.

23:56

Schools banned chat TPT and everyone

23:59

predicted student... students would cheat. But

24:02

the story is more complicated.

24:04

Students are using AI in lots of

24:06

different ways. As AI tools

24:08

multiply, the line between schoolwork

24:11

and plagiarism is getting blurred.

24:14

Schools may have to rethink education.

24:17

One of the very mature teenagers at

24:19

the Perth High School, Barron, summed

24:22

it up best. The problem about integrating

24:24

AI into school is that it's pretty

24:26

hard to enforce the

24:28

difference between using it for research

24:30

and using it for cheating. Even if it's

24:33

easy to find out that someone's cheating, preventing

24:36

someone from cheating in the first place would be very

24:38

difficult. So, that's students.

24:41

For them, AI can be great. It's

24:43

something they use to benefit themselves.

24:47

For actors, it's a different story. AI

24:50

is something that happens to them. And

24:52

we'll have to see if the New Deal struck with studios

24:55

means they actually get paid when their

24:57

digital replica gets used. For

24:59

writers, well, they're getting their words scraped from

25:02

the internet and fed back to them as

25:04

AI content. And they

25:06

have to compete with it. In every

25:08

story, it's roughly the same technology.

25:11

It's all generative AI. The

25:13

difference is who's using it and

25:16

who's getting used, who benefits

25:18

and who loses out. This

25:24

is Hello AI Overlords, a science-fiction

25:26

series. You can find our previous

25:28

episodes on the ABC Listen app. See

25:31

you next week.