‘Dead Internet Theory‘ could be closer to becoming a reality, as Facebook and Instagram parent company Meta has unveiled new plans to stock its social media platforms with fake AI users.
The controversial Dead Internet Theory posits that bots and algorithms designed to manipulate society have completely taken over the internet. Although the theory exaggerates current real world online conditions, Meta’s plan to host full AI accounts in the next two years will do little to calm its adherents.
Countdown To AI
Meta is quickly developing technology to allow its 3 billion users to create AI characters. The company believes AI is essential in competing with rivals for a next-generation audience who see Facebook and Instagram as their parent’s social media platforms.
Meta’s vice president of product for generative AI, Connor Hayes, told the Financial Times that they expect AI accounts to become a significant feature of the platforms in coming years. These artificial accounts will have their own bios and can generate and share content independently. Hayes explained that AI content is a priority for the company, with plans to make AI interaction more social over the next two years. Hundreds of thousands of characters have been created using the tool since its July launch. So far, most of these characters have remained private creations that are not available to public members of the service.
Most public-facing AI use on the platform has been in editing real users’ content, yet the next wave of products aims to blur the line. Meta has allowed users to create AI assistants to answer follower questions. In an earlier demonstration, founder Mark Zuckerberg showed off an AI avatar that could converse in live video calls, although there were some guard rails on the projects, which included allowing creators to tell their avatars to avoid or emphasize specific topics.
Next year, Meta says it plans to build on the technology by releasing text-to-video software, allowing creators to put themselves into AI videos.
Meta’s younger competitors are also deep into the AI game, with Snapchat releasing its own generative AI tools in September that allow creators to design 3D characters for augmented reality experiences.
Snapchat has seen a 50 percent increase in user engagement with AI lenses, and along similar lines, Bytedance is keeping up through its Symphony AI suite for TikTok. This advertising-focused suite can create ads, avatars, and language translations from text prompts.
Concerns About Social Media AI
While Meta does plan to label AI-generated content on its platforms clearly, the risk of intentional misuse persists. This could range from serious political manipulation to simply flooding the platform with low-quality content.
However, other serious concerns persist regarding the proliferation of AI, which include a mother who sued an AI chatbot company after her son’s suicide. At the same time, Meta’s platforms have become dumping grounds for low-quality AI-generated artwork, commonly called “AI slop,” incentivized through content monetization.
Web 2.0 began with the promise of a democratized internet but ended with lower user engagement than ever. Instead of users actively sharing, studies are finding more and more users opting to passively consume their feeds. Since the 2010s, feeds have slowly changed from mostly accounts users followed to large amounts of spam, ads, and boosted influencer posts.
It remains to be seen if the increasingly advertising-focused content featured on such platforms will succeed at keeping users engaged in the years ahead.
Ryan Whalen covers science and technology for The Debrief. He holds an MA in History and a Master of Library and Information Science with a certificate in Data Science. He can be contacted at ryan@thedebrief.org, and follow him on Twitter @mdntwvlf.