OpenAI SORA 2 is NOT decentralized creativity

OpenAI Sora 2 is the latest increment in the tech overlords’ attack on our minds.

Being online is tiring these days. Algorithms suck you in, take your time away from you. And now, OpenAI is trying to make that much worse… OpenAI’s newest video model, Sora 2, comes with a destructive, addictive app, and it’s a window into the gloomy future we have to look out for.

I’m an AI researcher, but my true passion is Art, and I strive to be a pro one day. If you’ve been told “AI decentralizes creativity therefore it’s good” and knew it was wrong, but didn’t know how to say it… My goal in this post is to tell you exactly why these people are wrong.

Ever since the start of AI slop back in 2023, people have been arguing that AI is great and it gives everyone the power to express themselves. How many great, disruptive AI artists have we seen since then ?

A recent model release by OpenAI, Sora 2 is a video model just like the ones before (literally the same technology, just slightly incremented, better data, and orchestration between different generation steps). Basically, it stitches plausible motion between frames and guesses matching audio. All information about framing, staging, audio design, all the frames of the video together, is contained in a single representation. This is highly technical but not groundbreaking. And yet, it raises the bar for realism so high, you’ve probably been fooled by a Sora 2 video, without knowing it was fake.

In a recent blog post, Sam Altman (the OpenAI CEO) announced Sora 2 as a “ChatGPT for creativity,” saying it could unleash a “Cambrian explosion” of new art.

Forget the PR !! judge Sora 2 by what decisions it automates away from the artist. The discovery journey it steals away from us.

Actually, Sam Altman might know one or two things about Art that you don’t know… First, he wants to maintain his power over people, to maintain an addicted, mindless userbase. Genuine artist won’t fall for that. He knows it intuitively : he cannot hook strong, independent thinkers to his apps. So, in order to keep people in this lower state, he has to undermine values that grow people strong. He has to turn all positive values on their head.

In this post I’ll walk you through 2 such values that the AI sphere are trying to undermine.

If you’re exhausted or feel sidelined by ‘AI art,’ you’re not broken. You’re sane. I promise you this’ll be of great help to actually understand the battle that’s happening right under our noses.

Your creativity and curiosity belong here.

Sora 2 adds physical reasoning, spatial audio, all-in-one temporal consistency and video-audio co-generation… That’s cool. But none of it is being done by the person who makes the so-called “art”. It’s effortless. How can it be a plus to creativity ? How can it make people grow ?

This cannot be said enough.. Science and technology are the biggest creativity killers. You need only look into “creativity science” as proof. They consider creativity from a computational perspective : they want to measure how “statistically unlikely” a person’s idea is, and how much a jury judges the idea to be creative. That’s their whole definition.

Aren’t they missing a few things ? Like… Cultural significance ? Wisdom ? Spiritual depth ? Genuine shaking of the foundations of reality ?

Yes, they are. I work in science. Trust me, it’s a mess.

And most people nowadays worship science. That’s why Sam Altman can say Sora 2 is “a pure force for creative good” and get away with it !

But far from building people up, this release will tear them down. They accompanied it with an app, that’s been called “SlopTok”, for fair reasons. Basically, it’s got the TikTok, infinite scroll interface, and you can effortlessly generate your own, fully-fake videos, to share with everyone. It’ll give you a fake impression of accomplishment, but in fact you’re just playing with a toy. And in the meantime, it’ll suck you in with highly addictive, infinite content, fed to you by an algorithm that knows exactly how to play with your dopamine system to enslave you.

We artists are these lightmakers. We stand against this downgrading of humanity, and we won’t give up on good old, human values. To achieve this legacy, it is critical that we escape from doomscrolling. I’ve already almost eliminated it from my life. I used my phone only 1 hour last week. This is how we take the power back.

Your experience will be valued forever.

Now let’s get to the good stuff.. The idea of the decentralization of Art.

There are two words in this : “decentralization” and “art”. Both are completely wrong.

Sam Altman himself has made arguments about Sora democratizing art. This so-called de-centralization claim is one of the boldest things to say, really. Because here’s the truth : The data for these models is centralized. There are countless biases about what art should look like in this data, that no user can get away from. The technique for generating videos is the same for every single user who uses Sora. And last but not least, in Sam Altman’s vision, everyone in the entire world goes through this single company, to create “art”.

Is that “decentralization ?”

Next up: “Art”. The way people use that word nowadays is sickening. It seems the word now just means “content”, or “image”, or “video”. A kind of effortless, skill-less production that is meant to communicate at a surface level, just like small talk. Effortlessness isn’t a good thing. Their singular journey towards Art is what makes an artist unique. If it is effortless and instantaneous, it inevitably just repeats the message of the age, without any depth. Without the pain and struggle, without lived experience, you’re left with the dopamine-seeking part of your brain. You’re left creating “funny” or “weird” videos with AI, that get people to click.

Is that “art” ?

I know you and I have both swallowed the struggle-pill. We both know the path to meaning isn’t easy. Artists in general do. We’re excited to take on a challenge, and see not only our skills, but our minds, our virtue, grow in turn.

Your craft still matters.

My own practice lives in reality. I do everything in ateliers, by hand, and with no technology in sight. That may not be accessible to all artists. But if you have this opportunity, it’s the best choice there is.

So that’s how they get you : they turn everything upside down : top-down control and centralization are called decentralization. Addiction is called creativity.

But we, the lightmakers, are better than that.

The statistics clearly show that when given the choice, art buyers always prefer the human-made art. This is also the case with art collectors, and gallery owners.

My plan is to create a strong framework for how art must be positioned in the face of AI. With expertise in AI and a long practice and even longer love of Art, I’m giving it everything I have.

The tech bros may have won the battle, but their power is temporary. The old values of humanity die hard. Take it from an AI researcher : AI is not this amazing thing they make it out to be. It’s a weird system that imitates humans, scaled to its limits by ambitious oligarchs. It’s a shallow, surface-level beast that requires the effort of the entire human race to function. Take out the current world order, and AI can hardly exist anymore.

This world they are building is not sustainable. People are revolting. Social order is collapsing everywhere, because everyone can tell in their guts where this is going. The planet itself is not a big fan of massive data-centers. And as things collapse (I’m not talking about a full-on collapse of course), a new type of people will step up. Those who believed in human values all throughout. Those who stood by their faith in the Earth, and looked for meaning in her, not in machines, money or space.

In the darkness that engulfs the world in cycles, there is always a group of people who make light. You are part of this group.

Your mission, along with mine and anyone else who reads this, is to make art that imagines the new world after AI.

It is our mission to make Art that improves the world, and changes consciousnesses.

Till next time,

ArtPostAI.

(credit for the post image : Mart TENNANT, Phone Couple, Oil on canvas)