I actually think this was a good thing. Manipulating images incredibly convincingly was already possible but the cost was high (many hours of highly skilled work). So many people assumed that most images they were seeing were "authentic" without much consideration. By making these fake images ubiquitous we are forcing people to quickly learn that they can't believe what they see on the internet and tracking down sources and deciding who you trust is critically important. People have always said that you can't believe what you see on the internet, but unfortunately many people have managed without major issue ignoring this advice. This wave will force them to take that advice to heart by default.

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slfnflctd 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

I remember telling my parents at a young age that I couldn't be sure Ronald Reagan was real, because I'd only ever seen him on TV and never in real life, and I knew things on TV could be fake.

That was the beginning of my journey into understanding what proper verification/vetting of a source is. It's been going on for a long time and there are always new things to learn. This should be taught to every child, starting early on.

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arkmm 24 minutes ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I used to also have this optimistic take, but over time I think the reality is that most people will instead just distrust unknown online sources and fall into the mental shortcuts of confirmation bias and social proof. Net effect will be even more polarization and groupthink.

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manuelabeledo 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

> By making these fake images ubiquitous we are forcing people to quickly learn that they can't believe what they see on the internet and tracking down sources and deciding who you trust is critically important.

Has this thought process ever worked in real life? I know plenty of seniors who still believe everything that comes out of Facebook, be AI or not, and before that it was the TV, radio, newspapers, etc.

Most people choose to believe, which is why they have a hard time confronting facts.

	▲	rootusrootus 2 hours ago \| parent [-]
		> I know plenty of seniors And not just seniors. I see people of all ages who are perfectly happy to accept artificially generated images and video so long as it plays to their existing biases. My impression is that the majority of humanity is not very skeptical by default, and unwilling to learn.

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lm28469 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

I feel like there is one or two generations of people who are tech savy and not 100% gullible when it comes to online things. Older and younger generations are both completely lost imho, in a blind test you wouldn't discern a monkey from a human scrolling tiktok &co

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manuelabeledo 2 hours ago | parent [-]

How so? This "tech savvy and not 100% gullible" generation, gave birth to a political landscape dominated by online ragebait.

	▲	lm28469 2 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Boomers used to tell us to never trust anything online and now they send their life savings to "Brad Pitt" New generations gets unlimited brain rot delivered through infinite scroll, don't know what a folder is, think everything is "an app" and keep falling for the "technology will free us from work and cure cancer" There was a sweet spot during which you could grow alongside the internet at a pace that was still manageable and when companies and scammers weren't trying so hard to robbyou from your time money and attention