| ▲ | crazygringo 2 days ago |
| From the linked tweet from YouTube's head of editorial: "No GenAI, no upscaling. We're running an experiment on select YouTube Shorts that uses traditional machine learning technology to unblur, denoise, and improve clarity in videos during processing (similar to what a modern smartphone does when you record a video)" https://x.com/youtubeinsider/status/1958199532363317467?s=46 Considering how aggressive YouTube is with video compression anyways (which smooths your face and makes it blocky), this doesn't seem like a big deal. Maybe it overprocesses in some cases, but it's also an "experiment" they're testing on only a fraction of videos. I watched the comparisons from the first video and the only difference I see is in resolution -- he compares the guitar video uploaded to YT vs IG, and the YT one is sharper. But for all we know the IG one is lower resolution, that's all it looks like to me. |
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| ▲ | CodingJeebus 2 days ago | parent | next [-] |
| This is an absolutely huge deal. It doesn't matter how small the scope of the change is, they thought it was a good idea to apply mandatory AI post-processing to user content without consent or acknowledgement. Secret experiments are never meant to be little one-offs, they're always carried out with the goal of executing a larger vision. If they cared about user input, they'd make this a configurable setting. |
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| ▲ | crazygringo 2 days ago | parent [-] | | Again, this isn't GenAI. The idea of it being "without consent" is absurd. Your phone doesn't ask you for consent to apply smoothing to the Bayer filter, or denoising to your zoom. Sites don't ask you for consent to recompress your video. This is just computational image processing. Phones have been doing this stuff for many years now. This isn't adding new elements to a video. It's not adding body parts or changing people's words or inventing backgrounds or anything. And "experiments" are just A/B testing. If it increases engagement, they roll it out more broadly. If it doesn't, they get rid of it. | | |
| ▲ | pbronez 2 days ago | parent | next [-] | | Yeah, the big video platforms are constantly working on better ways to store and deliver video. If this stuff is applying to some workflow that automatically generates Shorts from real videos... whatever. Very similar to experimenting with different compression schemes. Video compression can differ on a per-shot basis now! If you want to make pristine originals available to the masses, seed a torrent. | |
| ▲ | giantrobot 2 days ago | parent | prev [-] | | > Again, this isn't GenAI. Yet. | | |
| ▲ | crazygringo 2 days ago | parent [-] | | How about we stick to the facts of what is actually happening? I mean, I'm also not Brad Pitt. "Yet." | | |
| ▲ | giantrobot 2 days ago | parent [-] | | Given Google's history and the fact they rolled this out without notice or consent makes me feel comfortable saying "yet". If YouTube can get away with making GenAI YouTubers (via some likeness sign off buried in the T&C) without paying the originals I'm sure they'd love to do so. All the ad impressions with none of the payout to creators. Their AI answers box (and old quick answer box) has already affected traffic to outside sites with answers scraped from those sites. Why wouldn't they make fake YouTubers? > I mean, I'm also not Brad Pitt. "Yet." Not with that attitude! |
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| ▲ | qwertox 2 days ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| This is similar to how AI enhanced photos are a non-issue. If one zooms into a photo taken by a Google Pixel device, you clearly see that these are no longer normal JPEG artifacts. Everything has so odd swirls in it down to the smallest block. |
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| ▲ | depingus 2 days ago | parent | prev [-] |
| If you watch the youtube video[1] linked in the article you get a much better examples, that clearly look like AI slop. Tho I do understand that people's ability to discern AI slop varies wildly. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=86nhP8tvbLY |
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| ▲ | crazygringo 2 days ago | parent [-] | | > that clearly look like AI slop That's not what AI slop means. There's no GenAI. I watched the video. It's literally just some mild sharpening in the side-by-side comparison. | | |
| ▲ | depingus 2 days ago | parent [-] | | Whatever youtube is doing adds a painted over effect that makes the video look like AI slop. They took a perfectly normal looking video, and made it look fake. As a viewer, if you can't tell or don't care... That's fine. For you. But at the very least, the creator should have a say. | | |
| ▲ | crazygringo 2 days ago | parent [-] | | I don't think you know what "AI slop" means. It's not making the videos look fake, any more than your iPhone does. Most of what's shown in the example video, it might very well be phones applying the effect, not YouTube. | | |
| ▲ | depingus 2 days ago | parent [-] | | At no point did I say the video IS AI slop. Or that generative AI was used to make it, or the effect youtube applied to it. We actually have no idea what youtube did. We only see the result; which can be subjective. To you, that result looks like it was shot with a phone filter. To me it looks like it was generated with AI. Either way, it doesn't really matter. It's not what the creator intended. Many creators spend a lot of effort and money on high-end cameras, lenses, lighting, editing software, and grading systems to make their videos look a specific way. If they wanted their videos to look like whatever this is, they would have made it that way by choice. | | |
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