AI Commercials Consuming Media

Sarah Ramming, managing editor

The Super Bowl commercials are famous for being funny and well-made. Most Super Bowl commercials, because of the large audience, are made to be some of the best commercials, especially because of the cost of the commercial space. The Hyundai “Smaht Pahk” ad with John Krasinski and Chris Evans, as well as the “Wassup” ad by Budweiser in 2000, are some notable examples. This year, during Super Bowl 60, the number of commercials made with AI nearly overwhelmed the amounts that were not.  

Claude, a content generator like ChatGPT, is a “constitutional AI” which means that the AI is trained to avoid harmful or unethical content. Along with ChatGPT, it ran Super Bowl ads. All advertising was created by AI. 

Not only do AI companies use it for advertising, but renowned companies do too. Coca-Cola, during the holiday season, pushed an ad-made almost entirely from AI, sparking arguments all over the internet over how AI should be used in the advertising sector. Nike has used AI for a couple of specialized advertising campaigns like the #Nike50 project, where different eras of Serena Williams faced off against opponents in tennis matches. 

The amount of damage to both the environment and people’s free thought continues to increase as AI becomes commonplace at work and at home. AI is being added to everything, from Google to Apple, to any ordinary website as a chatbot. By itself, that seems fine, yet while ordinary websites are using AI to answer questions from users, the amount of energy and water consumed demands far too much of local water systems as well as local ecosystems.  

According to a report by the International Energy Agency, electricity consumption from data centers has grown an extraordinary amount, at a rate of almost 12% over the last five years. In 2022 alone, the global electricity consumption of data centers rose to 460 terawatt hours; making AI data centers the 11^th largest consumer of electricity in world. 

AI has become a presence that no one can avoid completely. Unfortunately, not many people feel the need to avoid this plague on humanity. Many people have started to rely on AI for any task that may just need a little more thought than normal.  

Another negative is that currently, AI is not accurate. It gives incorrect answers or information that can lead those who use it in the wrong direction. Users have pointed out that AI just generates the most likely answer to the question. Some sources that are cited do exist- yet the information claimed to be contained does not.  

Although AI does allow for quicker generation of commercials as well as at a cheaper cost, there are a lot of differing opinions on the use of AI for advertising, as well as in our modern lives. 

“A vast majority of people don’t care [about the use of AI] ... Artists see themselves being pushed out of their spaces, with producers only caring about the money they make and not about the people being cut out” said Mr. Shearer, the principal of Johns Creek High School. He also mentioned the Dunkin ad from this year’s Superbowl as the only one that stood out to him in a positive light. The newly coined “Good Will Dunkin” was the best of the bunch, only noticeably using AI to de-age the actors who played roles in the ad.  

As with any other industry right now, people are worried about AI taking jobs. It will most likely continue to dominate as visuals improve, and human interaction is needed less and less to clean up the ads. Our world will continue to adapt to these new technologies as we learn more about how far we can push those limits.