Borkowski Weekly Media Trends: AInsanity | Coronation Desperation & More...

PLUS Frank Ocean's Coachella Hell | Twitter ends its Blue Tick era

AInsanity

2023's AI explosion has drummed up controversy and debate across the creative industries this week. At the epicentre is a track called "heart on my sleeve", a song packaged as Drake and Weeknd collaboration. It sounded like a Drake song but was AI-generated, mimicking their vocal stylings. The song is catchy and features a long-overdue Weeknd/Drake collaboration making this a viral moment, but who was profiting off this success? A critical question prompted Universal into action, claiming copyright as UMG represents both artists.

Then we have the release of AIsis - a breakout album full of 'Oasis' anthems, again of course, generated by AI. On this side of the Atlantic, an Oasis return is more culturally significant than a short Weeknd/Drake collab, but both tracks tease sounds that fans have been dying to hear. And whilst these aren't authentic moments, it poses a few questions. Does AI threaten artistry, and how will labels and fans react? Labels and producers will be desperately trying to take advantage of this tech - speeding up production to feed consumers with sugary sweet bangers. However, cutting-edge and boundary-pushing music is safe. The clue is in the details of these viral songs - AI-generated music doesn't quite sound right, whether it's the mix or finer vocal inflections.

Then we have the Sony World Photography Award 2023, rocked when German winner Boris Eldagsen revealed he created his entry using AI and refused the award. It is a brilliant stunt he used as a platform to "speed up this debate" on using AI in the industry. This is a more effective way to prompt constructive discussion about AI than we've previously seen, for instance, the Elon Musk-backed open letter demanding AI research and pause that we've previously criticised here.

And there's a more sinister and spooky AI-related news story after German magazine Die Aktuelle featured an 'exclusive' Michael Schumacher interview produced by AI, prompting his family to pursue legal action. Schumacher has not been seen in public since he suffered a severe brain injury in a skiing accident almost a decade ago. So for a news outlet to package this interview as an exclusive is disturbing and raises serious questions about privacy.

Clearly AI can create new and exciting experiences for fans, and we have a lot of fascinating things to learn via this technology. But it also raises concerns about authenticity, ownership, and responsibility over different creations, ensuring proper use. We will see more Schumacher-type stories in the coming months if there isn't adequate regulation to safeguard people from bad actors looking to exploit this groundbreaking technology.

Coronation Desperation

Not even a year has passed since the late Queen’s Platinum Jubilee, and the British supermarkets have been blessed with the next royal marketing opportunity. King Charles’ coronation, scheduled to raise the spirit of the nation or, if not, provide it with an excuse for many a corporate stunt.

Whilst M&S is set to crown its flagship Colin the Caterpillar cakes (at the princely extra cost of £1.50 per cake), Waitrose, long known to compete with the former and scheme to put an end to the Colin supremacy, has come out with the King’s Coronation Jewel the Jack Russell Cake. The cake remains caterpillar-presenting, but it does have a dog face, and comes at a premium price. The indolence of the other supermarkets to come up with a widely understood symbol for Charles – bar the crown - highlights the new monarch’s relatively sparse iconography compared to that of his mother, perhaps precisely because he has long been refusing to be reduced to a symbolic function. An avid royalist might know of the King’s love for Jack Russell terriers, but the breed is in need of some further PR consultancy if it plans to reach the Corgi echelons.

Following the gastronomic trend, there is of course the Coronation Quiche. The choice of a relatively cheap and pantry basics-based dish has been described as ‘recessioncore’ by some, and environmentally conscious by others (note the lack of meat), arguably both readings reflecting well on the King as someone who seems in touch with reality.

Finally moving onto another industry entirely, a sex doll manufacturer Inferno did not skip a beat going after Coronation publicity when it decided to reveal that Lady Diana, Kate Middleton and Meghan Markle are regularly among their top celeb doll requests in this New York Post article. In poor taste? Perhaps, but so are all the desperate attempts to capitalise on the big Royal events, and don’t we all share a secret love for memorabilia and merchandise – it seems only right that those are tailored to all, niche perhaps, tastes of the British public. 

Frank Ocean’s CoacHELLa

Despite the British weather suggesting otherwise, #FestivalSeason officially begun last weekend, with the opening of Coachella. Previous years have seen headline artists elevated to legend status (see: Daft Punk, Kendrick Lamar, Beychella) whilst also uncovering the playlist of songs that will dominate the upcoming summer. By contrast however, this year’s opening weekend was a decidedly off affair, with only one artist dominating the headlines, albeit for all of the wrong reasons.

Frank Ocean, who hasn’t released a new album for more than 7 years, was scheduled to fill the epic, Sunday night, closing slot. Within minutes of the line-up announcement back in January, fans began speculating about the release of a new album and a potential tour. However, when it came to it, those fans barely even got a performance of the old albums. Frank appeared on stage an hour late, having scrapped an elaborate set involving an ice rink and skaters. Instead, he largely sat through his short, forty minute performance, before a quick Irish exit.

Within minutes, headlines appeared labelling the performance ‘disastrous’, whilst likening Ocean’s contempt for his fans to the Kanye West. Simultaneously, the rumour mill started grinding out stories with ‘sources’ claiming Frank had a ‘wild flip’ minutes before his slot, involving shouts and screams, and that he had injured his leg in rehearsals. This latter point was then used to excuse Frank from performing again at the second weekend, an announcement that in turn invited more trolling.

The fact that Frank recently lost his younger brother, Ryan Breaux, to a car crash is a point his critics appear to have skimmed over. Ocean and him were said to have been incredibly close, with Breaux reportedly serving as inspiration for many of Ocean’s biggest hits. Ocean’s actions therefore appear a bit less surprising, given this was his first live performance since the loss.

The off-performance, and the flood of trolling that followed, has an eery parallel to some of Amy Winehouse’s final festival appearances, where her stilted performances were hounded down by trolls and the media alike, despite her very public battles with mental health and addiction. Demi Lovato, Miley Cyrus and Jesy Nelson have all similarly spoken of how their battles with mental health sometimes played out very publicly on stage, only for them to be ruthlessly dragged by trolls. This most recent fiasco is therefore a melancholic reminder that whilst mental health awareness has made its way into law firms, banks and even the Royal Household, that grace still doesn’t appear to extend to the stars.

Twitter Ends Blue Ticks

Twitter’s sunsetting of ‘Blue Ticks’ - the identity authenticators that came to be a mark of influence and celebrity in the platform’s first age- is the clearest indication yet of its metamorphosis.

The puerile ceremony surrounding the move, chiefly Elon Musk’s decision to implement it on 4/20 (presumably in a bid play to his core audience of 16 year-old boys from 2001) added extra vigour to the eyes already rolling at the move.

Twitter Blue Ticks had been cheapened slightly by the early-mid 2010s wave of new media nobodies who secured them from Twitter employee drinking buddies, but it was still a reasonable indication that somebody's content was going to be worth a glance, played an important safeguarding role, and overall did good things for the platform’s credibility.

The replacement Twitter Blue programme (and the more expensive Twitter Gold) seem to have missed the point. Anyone who can afford the princely sum of $8pcm can now have their Tweets boosted in random directions on the loose proviso that they comply with Elon-era Twitter’s bedraggled and malfunctioning regulations. These failsafe measures have so far been unable to prevent (inter alia) imposters ‘verifying’ themselves as public entities they have nothing to do with (often to hawk crpyto scams) and overt Nazis amplifying their poisonous rhetoric.

In short, the best-case scenario is that a Blue Tick now means nothing, at worst it should be actively mistrusted.

To add insult to injury, the end of Blue Ticks is going to deprive fans of updates from their idles. Despite Elon’s cringeworthy personal funding of certain celebs’ ‘Blue’ status, it now takes much more than a glance to verify that you are seeing content from the real Cristiano Ronaldo or Beyonce. If these stars start noticing a drop in engagement, or a rise in imposterism, how long will they bother putting energy into the platform?

This isn’t to say Twitter is doomed. Just that its inability to verify its most prominent responsible users may have set it on a track to becoming a Wild West of Snake Oil salesman, free speech evangelists and con artists. Would you want to spend any time in such a place?