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Well, yesterday Youtube served me up an ad for an "AI" algorithmic trading service "only available to Canadians" and "backed by Elon Musk. It used "AI" generat

by bcrl 3y ago

Well, yesterday Youtube served me up an ad for an "AI" algorithmic trading service "only available to Canadians" and "backed by Elon Musk. It used "AI" generated audio and video of Musk to peddle an unregistered securities trading firm that tries to prey on the uninformed. That video is clearly disinformation / misinformation. There is zero chance that video would be played on a conventional broadcaster. Why? They have to be accountable for the content they put in front of viewers. Conventional broadcasters have to participate in advertising standards councils and answer to regulators. On the other hand, platforms are unaccountable and unwilling to act in the public interest. Profit trumps all. The average person has no idea how to record an ad that was just shown to them by a "platform". That video that was in the corner of the webpage that turns out to be scammy? Ooops, you scrolled too far or used the back button and it's now gone. There's a large swath of problems online that are clearly misinformation and / or disinformation. Nothing is going to improve on this front so long as "platforms" are wholly unaccountable to the general public. And we're running blindly forward into making this far, far worse before anything will change now that generative AI lowers the bar to produce bullshit that looks convincing on the first pass. Big tech disappoints me to no end.

GoblinSlayer 3y ago
>On the other hand, platforms are unaccountable and unwilling to act in the public interest. Broadcasters don't act in the public interest either, they act in owner's interest.
machina_ex_deus 3y ago
So you assume your fellow humans are stupid and will fall for this crap, and must be protected at all costs including the cost of regulation preventing speech? By the way, how's that scammer SBF doing? I heard he managed to scam even more money than that funny YouTube ad, and I think he was advertising on mainstream media too. Even got to lobby in Congress. This is still far from the leading mainstream narrative that "your fellow humans are stupid". By your anecdote I can learn that here we have another person who's capable of recognizing false information, therefore it isn't dangerous. Anyone who fell for disinformation is welcome to step in and contribute an anecdote to the opposite statistics so maybe I'll be convinced people really are guillible and need protecting. Somehow it's always other people who the speaker thinks are more stupid and will fall for something he sees as a scam.
- bcrl 3y ago
  I have no expectation that everyone will fall for it, but I've seen my own elderly father get confused and drawn into scam ads. My irritation is that what little accountability in advertising that existed in the past is now gone, and that "platforms" are failing the general public by allowing these things to propagate. Put a button in the corner of the ad that says "report this", and get a human to check if the ad passes a smell test. If a platform can cancel accounts of random people for violating policies at random, they can put a small amount of effort into enforcing policies on advertisers.
  - machina_ex_deus 3y ago
    So now it's the elderly. I've seen them fall for phone scams much more commonly, they usually don't have the technical ability to use the internet. You're deflecting from the disinformation narrative into elderly scam. Which I agree is a problem, just a completely different one than the disinformation narrative presents.
    - bcrl 3y ago
      It's still disinformation. It doesn't matter what segment of the population falls for it. It's not a real video of Elon Musk, and the get rich quick claims are as fake as always. Showing these ads is still immoral and unethical promotion of disinformation for profit.
      - listenallyall 3y ago
        You are conflating an advertisement -- a separate category, which normal people and regulators recognize as often being deceptive and manipulative -- with "news," including statements from current and formal government officials, and even testimony in courts and congressional hearings. Advertisements are often total bullshit (and I would likely consider anything created by AI to almost certainly be), but that is an entirely different phenomenon than today's concept of "disinformation."

by bcrl 3y ago

GoblinSlayer 3y ago

>On the other hand, platforms are unaccountable and unwilling to act in the public interest. Broadcasters don't act in the public interest either, they act in owner's interest.

machina_ex_deus 3y ago

So you assume your fellow humans are stupid and will fall for this crap, and must be protected at all costs including the cost of regulation preventing speech? By the way, how's that scammer SBF doing? I heard he managed to scam even more money than that funny YouTube ad, and I think he was advertising on mainstream media too. Even got to lobby in Congress. This is still far from the leading mainstream narrative that "your fellow humans are stupid". By your anecdote I can learn that here we have another person who's capable of recognizing false information, therefore it isn't dangerous. Anyone who fell for disinformation is welcome to step in and contribute an anecdote to the opposite statistics so maybe I'll be convinced people really are guillible and need protecting. Somehow it's always other people who the speaker thinks are more stupid and will fall for something he sees as a scam.

bcrl 3y ago
I have no expectation that everyone will fall for it, but I've seen my own elderly father get confused and drawn into scam ads. My irritation is that what little accountability in advertising that existed in the past is now gone, and that "platforms" are failing the general public by allowing these things to propagate. Put a button in the corner of the ad that says "report this", and get a human to check if the ad passes a smell test. If a platform can cancel accounts of random people for violating policies at random, they can put a small amount of effort into enforcing policies on advertisers.
- machina_ex_deus 3y ago
  So now it's the elderly. I've seen them fall for phone scams much more commonly, they usually don't have the technical ability to use the internet. You're deflecting from the disinformation narrative into elderly scam. Which I agree is a problem, just a completely different one than the disinformation narrative presents.
  - bcrl 3y ago
    It's still disinformation. It doesn't matter what segment of the population falls for it. It's not a real video of Elon Musk, and the get rich quick claims are as fake as always. Showing these ads is still immoral and unethical promotion of disinformation for profit.
    - listenallyall 3y ago
      You are conflating an advertisement -- a separate category, which normal people and regulators recognize as often being deceptive and manipulative -- with "news," including statements from current and formal government officials, and even testimony in courts and congressional hearings. Advertisements are often total bullshit (and I would likely consider anything created by AI to almost certainly be), but that is an entirely different phenomenon than today's concept of "disinformation."