Are Robots stealing Influencers’ Jobs?
Osaka Labs
We’re a Digital Studio focusing on social, retail and commerce for consumer brands.
With the progression of AI and technology, CGI graphics are becoming more realistic and refined. But will they soon reach a level where they will overtake humans in marketing?
Stripping everything back to basics, let’s ask ourselves, wtf is an influencer?
By definition, an influencer is a “person or thing that influences another”.
A person or THING? Now that’s interesting. A definition from 2019 says an “influencer’ is “one who exerts influence”. Here a social media influencer in marketing terms has the power to affect the purchasing decisions of others on various social media platforms. These individuals tend to collaborate with brands to try and test new products — either giving their audience their own opinion or introducing them to the brand’s product as a sponsorship.
An example here is from mega-influencer, Emma Chamberlain on Instagram.
Now that we got the basics, what is an AI influencer?
Although Google isn’t quite as trendy as I and can provide a definition, looking on the search engine it says, “AI influencers are virtual personalities managed by brands or media agencies and created with computer graphics technology and Machine Learning algorithms.” Which is very on point if you do ask us.
There are many different types of AI influencers, ranging from musicians to models to Kpop stars. 54% of all UK consumers find virtual entities appealing on some level. The most infamous of them all is @lilmiquela with 3M followers, making around $8,500 for a sponsored post.
A creation from the agency “Brud”, call the Brazilian model (if a virtual thing can be from brazil) and musical artist a “digital character” rather than an influencer. ‘She’ is estimated to earn €8,960,000 per year, or over $10 million.
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How is this good for brands?
How could they possibly be bad for brands?
The problem with everything being fake is that it blurs and normalizes this fake online reality, creating an unrealistic view of the world around us. Perfect virtual people aren’t the best for regular human body images. Furthermore, there’s a big issue with representation and the ‘stealing’ of real people’s jobs.
An example of this is with AI model, Shudu, created by the photographer Cameron-James Wilson and AI Rapper, FN Meka, who was signed to Capitol Records, but later dropped after being accused of blackface, repeated use of the N-word and imagery of being beaten by the police.
Do these AI influencers create more opportunities for diversity and representation on social media or do they racially plagiarize and stereotype?
Here, the issue is that there aren’t many jobs for POC or BAME in general in modelling or rather in entertainment, so for a fake ‘person’ to take work from others is truly backwards.
It’s also worth mentioning the first influencer with Down Syndrome, Kami for Down Syndrome International (DSi). Created by over 100 women with down syndrome by using their faces and characteristics, Kami is the face of representation for this group. But why can’t an actual person with Down Syndrome represent them instead?
Currently, India is the only country to enforce rules regarding AI influencers within their advertising standards, requiring brands to “disclose to customers that they are not interacting with a real human being”. When posting content.
So what’s next for AI influencers?
More and more immersive technologies and experiences are being made available, even more readily available for the average person with TikTok’s AI effects and filters. We could see more influencers coming our way, even making it to the mainstream, away from the internet and on our way to the big screen perhaps?
Let us know what you think of all this. Creepy or Innovative?