Cloudy Thinking
Text-to-video prompt: A young man at his 20s is sitting on a piece of cloud in the sky, reading a book
Explore further: OpenAI Sora + full Introducing Sora video (10 min)
Where do you do your best thinking?
Inside. Outside. Feet on the ground. Head in the clouds.
Or inside an AI generated video... ?!
As you watch and wonder at the ground-breaking generative AI work by OpenAI and others – from words to images and now with the public preview of incredible Sora text-to-videos like this one – take time to think, and explore the possible impacts.
The pen is mightier than the sword. So then if a picture is worth a thousand words, how many words might a video be worth? The answer is far more complex than 1,000 x 60 frames per second.
I've learnt that to explore the future it’s not enough to be a technologist.
Futures Thinking requires also being a sociologist.
If genAI can write this email, my job is done. Except when you start to think through the social implications of audiences drowning in a sea of auto-generated words, we realise the nature of work is evolving. And when everyone has access to similar tools (a.k.a. mass-market adoption) humanity’s competitive survival instincts ensure that markets then value new rare human attributes.
The impact of this futures dynamic is it flattens seemingly exponential growth curves – to the clouds and beyond – back towards the earth in an S curve. With the next resulting great challenge to be solved – whether it’s technical or social. Or inevitably a fusion of the two.
Remember the risk is not the technology, it’s how we all choose to use it. Because life is never as simple as doing good, while doing no harm.
‘Good’ has always been and always will be a subjective concept. Some things are definitively good… to most. Other things are definitively not good… to almost all.
And on the one hand regulation fairly protects us, while on the other hand it unfairly constrains us.
Technology + Sociology.
These are complex questions to be solved. With incredible potential for the greater good.
As long as we keep our feet on the ground. While also allowing our heads to be in the clouds.
Otherwise we won’t see the future.
Just over the horizon.
Ready to explore technological shifts?
Give yourself space to think by joining us online for a free monthly Futurist Hour