About this time last year, only the cool kids – or, let’s say, the nerdiest cool kids – knew what generative AI was.
Now, just months after being introduced, ChatGPT has permeated culture.
It’s being integrated with Bing. It’s considered a credible threat to Google. And generative AI is already going rogue, with so-called “hallucinating chatbots” doing exactly what HAL did in “2001: A Space Odyssey” and professing affection while also having nefarious intent. Now we know why all those tech billionaires have bunkers in Utah – they had an early read on what might happen if AI runs amok.
Practically speaking, generative AI is turning out to be a Swiss Army knife for ad agencies. They’re using tools like DALL-E to sketch out creative ideas and create concept art. And media agencies are using ChatGPT for keyword research and outsourcing scripts for marketing videos.
It’s a whole new world out there, but could AI’s potentially time-saving abilities threaten the full-time work model that rewards agencies for grinding out hourly work?
Zooming out, we also look at the broader disruptive effects of AI in marketing, including how it’s changing the competitive set. Over the next year, we’ll see it spawn dozens of startups and AI-led companies, fueling a crowded, messy and (semi)lawless space. But just so everyone knows: The FTC is watching how companies use AI.
