Module 5 - Parker MacDonald

 For this assignment I chose to focus on AI Narratives, but more specifically the talk by Kai-Fu Lee (2022) on the Ten Vision for Our Future. I wanted to take a look at the various content on Pinterest about AI and noticed how many pins were from years past. I decided to create a short timeline of the perspectives we had on AI as time passed and the technology improved.

The first image is an artistic interpretation of I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream (IHNMIMS) by Harlan Ellison written in 1968. As mentioned by Benson (2022), the story showcased the biggest fear about AI, that it would become evil. This image by Marcin Zygmunt (2022) captures the paranoia and fears of the robotic apocalypse imbued into IHNMIMS as is the most visually striking of the pins.

Next was an image of the terminator, attached to a blog post by Vellmure (2012). In it, Vellmure briefly talks about the then announced Innovega iOptik, AR contact lenses that were a little too early for its time. This is interesting to see, considering the recently released Apple Vision Pro and the amount of hardware for its time.

After that was a meaningful image that linked to a New York Times article written in 2017. The author, Metz (2017), discussed the money being poured into AI technologies and the general optimism for the technology. This was perhaps the beginning to the AI we use today and the start of a whole new industry.

Later is the infographic on “Chatbot Trends to Follow in 2019” by a digital marketing site called BrainCandy (n.d.). This was the introduction of machine learning language models into businesses and interestingly notes everything that is popular today. The infographic mentions the adaptation of AI in chatbots, for businesses, which at the time weren’t as developed as today. In five years, as the BrainCandy staff predicted, we are in fact seeing AI integrated into businesses more than ever.

Last of course, is a pin with the book that inspired this board. As discussed in the talk by Kai-Fu Lee (2022), it contains an interesting picture of the future of the world after AI becomes connected with almost every aspect of life.

Creating this pinboard was challenging, as I noticed how hard it was to find content that was not just visual but also insightful. I believe that Pinterest works not just as a search engine as said by Schwamberger (2019), but also as a great archive tool for finding results that Google would likely push to the bottom. Curating a meaningful and themed board on Pinterest was a great experience into how digital media can be selected and shown.

References

Benson, D. C. (2022, June 3). AI in Fiction and the Future of War. The Strategy Bridge. https://thestrategybridge.org/the-bridge/2022/6/3/ai-in-fiction-and-the-future-of-war

BrainCandy. (n.d.). Braincandy. https://www.braincandy.in/

Center for Natural and Artificial Intelligence. (2022, February 17). AI 2041: Ten Visions for Our Future [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IWTqS2_MfPE

Lee, K.F. (2022). AI 2041. AI 2041 Book by Dr. Kai-Fu Lee and Chen Qiufan. https://www.ai2041.com/

Metz, C. (2017, October 22). Tech giants are paying huge salaries for scarce A.I. talent. The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/22/technology/artificial-intelligence-experts-salaries.html

Schwamberger, B. A. (2019, August 10). Pinterest Strategy Tips for 2018: Learn the NEW metric that matters most! (+ a Free Content Guide!) -. https://brilliantbusinessmoms.com/pinterest-strategy-tips-2018-new-metric-free-content-guide/

Vellmure, B. (2012, April 4). When all of us have “Terminator Like” powers - Value Creator. Value Creator. https://www.brianvellmure.com/2012/04/04/when-all-of-us-have-terminator-like-powers/#.T4eBEvG26aM

Zygmunt, M. (2022). I have no mouth, and I must scream. ArtStation.