AI Made Me Do It
Exploring AI in Ordinaries of Everyday
>> on datasets, territories, and parasitic relationships
VR Seminar 2024
In our current era, the internet and artificial intelligence have permeated every facet of our existence, readily accessible from the convenience of our fingertips. These technologies, ranging from voice-based personal assistants to real-time generative models, have not only mediated but also actively shaped our online and offline experiences. This integration of digital intelligence into our daily lives has transformed our living spaces, personal habits, and even our interactions with various devices. This new reality challenges our understanding of vision, perception, space, and expression, introducing ambiguities in activities traditionally associated with human capabilities. Now, tasks like writing, seeing, learning, navigating, interacting, talking, driving, vacuuming, shopping, labor, and even elderly care are no longer exclusively human endeavors.
However, this technological advancement does not occur in isolation. The European Union’s recent enactment of the Artificial Intelligence Act on February 2nd, 2024, acknowledges the growing need for regulation and ethical oversight in this rapidly evolving field. This development coincides with the relentless pace of AI research and deployment by Silicon Valley giants like Nvidia, Google, and OpenAI, which are unveiling new AI models monthly, researching and expanding at an unprecedented pace, and feeding on the vast data derived from millions of human interactions and environments to learn how to operate within our physical world.
In the virtual reality seminar AI Made Me Do It we aimed to peel back the layers of AI’s presence in our lives. We thoroughly explored the realm of AI datasets that power these technologies, exploring their origins and the often-overlooked human labor that contributes to their formation. Questions were raised about the resources required for AI systems, like the number of home scans needed by a robotic vacuum to operate efficiently at home, the data necessary for a self-driving car to navigate urban environments, or the RayBan sunglasses dataset, which assists users with their gaze in their ordinary everyday lives. We also explored the human and environmental costs of training AI systems. We investigated the human labor behind these datasets, the territories from which data and resources are extracted, and the natural resources utilized. By examining datasets related to human habitats and everyday objects, we aimed at understanding how these elements are transformed into digital data and the consequent effects on our interactions with the world. We approached AI models with a critical and cultural lens, uncovering the stories and realities behind digital intelligences.
./studio3: Anna Pompermaier, Cenk Güzelis
students: Biever Jaques, Cakir Mehmet, Hamberger Caspar, Heil Pauline, Lazzari Luca, Stoff Leon, Wirth Jasmin, Ziegler Nina
xsleven_lelevenx-mart
a short film by Pauline Heil and Nina Ziegler
/x/sleven_leleven/x/-Mart is a short experimental film that takes viewers on a virtual shopping journey through the supermarket aisles of artificially constructed meaning. The film juxtaposes labels and labor, words and images, classifications and approximations, ultimately questioning human trust in this seemingly godlike machine.
Why is it so slippery in here?
ToyWorld
a short film by Jacques Biever and Luca Lazzari
Toy World is an interactive short film that ironically showcases an imaginary virtual learning environment for self-driving cars. It delves into the fusion of timeless human educational principles with deep learning algorithms for autonomous system training. The narrator, a child, guides us through her fantastical gamescape, featuring learning environments inhabited by various toys.
Automated Decision Making Process
a short film by Mehmet Cakir
def automated_decision(data):
if model.predict(data) > threshold:
return “Approve”
else:
return “Deny”
Automated Decision-Making Process is a short film where a cartoonish rabbit navigates a surreal AI-generated domestic space where everyday objects come to life. The film observes, humorously yet critically, the integration of AI in our homes, highlighting the absurdity and potential pitfalls of automated living. Whimsical scenarios and exaggerated transformations prompt reflection on the balance between human control and technological influence in shaping our domestic environments.
