Oh dear, Will Smith – this AI mess stinks of desperation

Will Smith has got himself into an embarrassing scrape that's painfully ironic, whilst completely exemplifying the slightly desperate edge he's had since that moment at The Oscars. Of course, it involves AI (as every decent scandal does at the moment), and it is exactly the opposite of what his personal brand needs at the moment. It's his biggest AI mess since that spaghetti video we were traumatised by.

The Fresh Prince is currently embarking on his comeback tour, and eagle eyes have spotted a use of generative AI that, frankly, belongs in 2023. The promo videos for the concerts contain footage of fans fawning and crying over his onstage performance, presumably to whip up the feeling that we all missed him very much and are delighted to see him back where he belongs. But unfortunately, those 'fans' have the distinct aroma of being AI generated, six fingers and all.

My favorite part of tour is seeing you all up close. Thank you for seeing me too ❤️ - YouTube

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Will Smith's YouTube account posted the video, with the tagline "My favourite part of tour is seeing you all up close". Which, of course, only draws attention to the 'people' in the crowd, the fact they seem not to be real and results in the overtone of desperation. It's a wrong step for someone trying to regain public relevancy and approval (redemption and forgiveness is apparently a big part of his onstage chat, according to sources at the gigs) – and something that could have been easily avoided.

Not only do the fans have the wrong number of fingers and hands that morph into objects, but there are also frames in the video where the people seem to have no eyes. Add to that a sea of weird-looking faces and distorted signs.

Some comments across the internet are blaming YouTube for its new AI image upscaler, which is being added to some videos to improve quality by the platform itself. But others assert that this is clearly generative AI and not an upscaler, which would only enhance footage rather than alter it to create extra limbs (etc).

If this is true then surely Will Smith has enough concert footage that they could have included a real audience. Or else what were the real fans doing at the concert? Were they not emotional enough? Perhaps they were stood stony-faced the whole way through, and not projecting the image Will Smith's brand apparently needs right now. What is needs are declarations that Will helped them "survive cancer" – and other extreme, emotional sentiments.

At the very least, someone on his team should have had the knowledge of AI markers to notice the issue – whether or not the video is gen AI. At this point, I'm starting to feel a bit sorry for Will, someone who used to ooze effortless 'cool'. He clearly doesn't quite know where to go with his brand to raise public opinion. But real people would be a good place to start.

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