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In my previous blog I explored AI’s transformative influence on short-form content in social media and delved into the efficiencies, personalization, and massive scalability that AI tools offer. As platforms like TikTok, Youtube and Instagram Reels become increasingly intertwined with AI-driven mechanisms, and as personal ventures like mine make the world of short-form content creation accessible to many, the ethical dimensions of this technology come into focus. While AI has reshaped the social media landscape, it also introduces complex questions of bias, authenticity, and the implications for human creators.

Often, AI systems, like the ones utilized in my previous blog, inherit biases from the datasets they are trained with. These datasets may have human prejudices and perspectives, leading to potential content misrepresentations (Levity, 2022). When I started looking into AI-assisted short-form content creation, the narratives were often influenced by popular trends. The risk lies in AI tools that might lean heavily towards these trends, sidelining minority or unconventional voices and perspectives.

During my experimental phase with AI-generated content, the ease with which AI tools crafted engaging narratives was something that really amazed me. But it made me wonder: in an age where machines can emulate human creativity, what becomes of genuine human expression and the content they create themselves? The blurry line between AI and human-generated content could lead to a situation were we do not value authentic human creativity anymore. Moreover, with the rise of deepfakes created by AI tools, the challenge isn’t just about the line between authentic content and AI-generated content, but also about the potential for misinformation on all of the social media platforms (Chesney & Citron, 2019).

I think AI’s efficiency in producing vast amounts of content can potentially overshadow human creators. While my personal experience highlighted AI as a really time-saving and valuable assistant, its use can also threaten individual content creators. The replication of popular trends by AI can also sideline niche content, leading to a potential homogenization of the digital content landscape.

In conclusion, as we use AI’s capabilities more and more during content creation, a responsible approach is really important. It’s not just about leveraging AI for efficiency but ensuring it complements human creativity rather than be a threat to it.

References

Levity. (2022). AI bias – what is it and how to avoid it? Retrieved October 19, 2023 from: https://levity.ai/blog/ai-bias-how-to-avoid#:~:text=Machine%20Learning%20bias%2C%20also%20known,of%20the%20Machine%20Learning%20process.

Chesney, R., & Citron, D. K. (2019). Deep Fakes: A Looming Challenge for Privacy, Democracy, and National Security. Calif. L. Rev., 107, 1753. Retrieved October 19, 2023 from: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3213954

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In the world of modern social media, two trends have unarguably dominated: the ascendancy of short-form content and the integration of artificial intelligence (AI) in content creation. Platforms like TikTok, Instagram Reels, and YouTube Shorts exemplify the immense popularity and potential of bite-sized content, offering viewers snippets of entertainment, education, or inspiration within a confined duration (Singh, 2023). Coupled with this is the increasing reliance on AI, driving efficiencies, personalization, and scale in content creation.

The attraction of short-form content has several reasons. In a digital age characterized by information overload, these brief engagements provide a quick moment of distraction, catering to the decreasing length of attention spans of social media users (Teixeira, 2014). They also fit seamlessly into the micro-moments of modern lives, whether it’s waiting for a coffee or taking a brief work break. The format’s inherent characteristics – brevity, immediacy, and often, virality – make it a powerful tool for content creators.

Seeing this shift in content consumption, I started looking into the realm of short-form content creation, seeking to understand its complexities and the role AI plays. I got inspired by videos that used ‘satisfying’ background videos that keep the viewer hooked. The audio of these video’s often consists of a narrator who reads out captivating riddles, anecdotes, and facts. I set out to replicate these formats. My methodology was grounded in the use of AI. First, I let ChatGPT generate riddles, stories and other similar text content to the video’s I had seen on social media. Second, I leveraged an AI voice generation tool that transformed these textual riddles and stories into auditory content, customized to various tones. After that, I deployed Adobe Premiere Pro’s automatic transcription and subtitling tool to create subtitles for these videos. The video templates were then further enhanced by Canva’s AI-driven video generator, allowing nuanced modifications to each video, facilitating the production of a vast array of differentiated content suitable for diverse platforms.

My deep-dive into AI-assisted short-form content creation was very revealing. It underscored the efficiencies AI can introduce, significantly reducing the manual effort and time traditionally associated with content creation. In no time I was able to create a very large amount of different short-form videos, without doing to much manual work. I am also blown away by the amount of AI-generated content I now recognise on social media platforms. This is something I was not able to identify previously.

In my opinion, the rise of short-form content and AI represents a transformative phase in social media’s evolution. As social media platforms evolve and users’ preferences shift, these trends will undoubtedly play an important role in shaping the future of social media content.

References

Singh, A. (2023). The rise of Short-Form Video Content: Reshaping digital media consumption. www.linkedin.com. https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/rise-short-form-video-content- reshaping-digital-media-aastha-singh/

Teixeira, T. S. (2014, 17 januari). The rising cost of consumer attention: why you should care, and what you can do about it – Working paper – Faculty & Research – Harvard Business School. Harvard                Business School. https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/item.aspx?num=46132