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  • 3 hours ago
Steve Backshall issues warning over 'AI slop' animal videos Source: Steve Backshall

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00:00Anyone else's feed filled up with heart-rending animal soap operas.
00:04Inevitably an animal or person dramatically saved by the bravery of another animal.
00:09Sorry, probably AI slop.
00:11These videos showing a tiger being rescued by an elephant, they're everywhere.
00:15But first off, look how slick the framing and camera movement is.
00:18The camera operator should be waist-deep in raging floodwaters with a tiger right next to them.
00:25Do you really think that the camera work is going to be that slick?
00:28And this one, this has millions of likes and very few people questioning it.
00:33A fox rescued from beneath the ice as its baby muse begging the human rescuer to intervene.
00:39All of these kinds of AI are designed to pull on our heartstrings.
00:42But also to play on our desire to humanise animals, to see bravery, altruism, interspecies friendships in wild animals.
00:51This is just a Disneyfication of nature. It is not real.
00:55So things to look out for.
00:56Is it a perfect Pixar mini-epic where every frame of the story is beautifully, gloriously captured?
01:03Who's filming it and why?
01:04If it feels too good to be true, it probably is.
01:07Do the animals appear to have no weight or impact?
01:10Or too much weight, as in this tiger slamming into a car?
01:13That's not to say none of these things ever happened.
01:14On Deadly 60, we had a wounded fur seal escaping great whites, hiding in our shark cage.
01:20And thankfully, we managed to help it back to safety.
01:22But the biggest challenge facing us in the media now is just recognising what's real and what isn't.
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