AI will be the death of the internet age

Arden Ram, Graphic Illustrator

I’ve had an off-and-on relationship with social media for years, chronically deactivating accounts for months at a time. The cycle is always the same: wanting to share with my friends and laugh at internet trends before getting sick of the doomscrolling shifts needed to stay up to date on Gen Z humor.

When I spend time scrolling, I quickly become tired of seeing AI generated images, videos and narrations flooding every social media platform. Notably, concern about AI’s impacts is shared by 50% of Americans.

I see modern AI integration in social media as representative of a general lack of effort and creativity on the internet, and that it will end up being its downfall.

Digitization isn’t new to our culture, nor is our resistance to it. Use of autotune and popularization of digital paintings have sparked criticism by music and art purists for decades.

Typically, if you don’t like something like a song or other piece of artwork, you can choose not to engage with it. Whether or not social media companies are ready to accept that, it’s exactly what our generation is doing with something that has permeated our day-to-day lives. Instead of welcoming platforms laden with AI, 64% of Gen Z is taking social media breaks or unplugging entirely. Our dissatisfaction with the direction online spaces are taking is clear.

But unlike a genre of music or art that we can choose to avoid, AI slop is becoming incorporated in every aspect of our internet presence, social media or not. Internet browsers attempt to provide results, often poorly, with their own AI summaries. Emails offer to write themselves, our phones ask if we want people to be added or removed in photos.

While seemingly unavoidable, AI can’t be deemed as inherently harmful, as it absolutely has value as a technological advancement. For example, artificial intelligence has become an expectation in the field of computer science, and can make the coding process faster. Using a chatbot to refine your resume is a quick and easy way to increase your chances of getting hired in a volatile job market.

Saving time and stress is exactly what innovations are expected to do, and AI has been in development since the 1950s.

I’m not upset that AI is advancing, but the way imagery and words are recycled online is exhausting as a media consumer. Even a supposedly professional networking site like LinkedIn has every other post AI generated, following the structure of shallow advice accompanied by random, useless emojis.

Culturally, we feed into this pattern with an obsession to go viral and be up-to-date on internet trends. When AI isn’t blatantly obvious, the amount of scripting and staged events internet creators use to stay relevant promotes this cycle instead of passion projects and original ideas.

Instead of rewarding AI slop with our time and attention, we can find authenticity through our offline entertainment. A flat note at a live concert or watching a joke fall flat allows us to feel connected with what we’re experiencing, the nuances of humanity that we lose with AI. 

Even when the quality of content is debatable, the memories from a mediocre display of creativity are going to resonate and inspire us a lot more than the brainrot you scroll past and forget. The rise of AI is showing how the internet is becoming its own downfall, but we can continue to take our distance and appreciate the mistakes that stem from our own creativity.