(Transcript) WX Drama Report: Artificial Stupidity

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[00:00:00] Hey everyone, Gabriel here. This is yet another episode that has been in the backlog for 8-9 months. Obviously the drama reports are typically current events related, which means this episode is severely outdated, but it was a fun enough conversation with Cassie and Alferia that I thought it was worth bringing out for all of you to experience.

[00:00:22] There will be one more little mini drama report episode like this and then my backlog will be officially cleared out. And that means brand spanking new episodes every single Monday from me, the host you know and love. Enjoy the episode, my friends.

[00:00:38] Gabriel: Howdy folks, and welcome back to another episode of the Chaser Chat WX Drama Report. It’s been a while since we’ve recorded one of these episodes. I’ve been busy with life stuff. Chasing hasn’t been exactly super exciting during the months of January and February, but fear not! Your fearless leaders in the drama industry are back to give our unabashed hot takes on a few different topics. And before we dive into them, I just wanted to remind everybody, because sometimes I forget to say this at the beginning of episodes, this is a not safe for work podcast. If you got little ears running around, if you’re in a public place that you don’t want them to know the kind of shit you listen to on a regular basis, I would 100 percent make sure you turn this off or at least put headphones on. And on that note, I will say hello to Cassie and the artist formerly known as Alferia. He’s now Algeria to me. Autocorrect finally got me to give in, buddy. I’m sorry.

[00:01:42] Alferia: It’s funny because now YouTube when you look up Alferia now, it no longer autocorrects. Do you mean Algeria?

[00:01:51] Cassie: I was about to say every time I used to look you up and be like, did you mean Algeria? And I’m like, absolutely fucking not. No.

[00:01:57] Gabriel: I just got tired of having to correct it every time I typed your name out. And at some point you just have to go with the flow and it is what it is. These are, by the way, for those of you who don’t know how the sauces is made with podcasts, because I remove the silences to make the conversation seem fluent. And also to make sure we don’t talk over one another, there are like a long, awkward pauses. That’s why you hear Cassie like snorting, like a little kid sometimes.

[00:02:21] Cassie: That’s when you, that’s when you know, the pause has gone on for a little too long.

[00:02:26] Gabriel: Yeah, you know what? That’s a little bit of a pro tip for those of you. Oh, go ahead, Alferia.

[00:02:31] Alferia: Speaking of me, hopefully you all enjoyed the first of probably one of very few times where you will hear me curse.

[00:02:38] Gabriel: Yeah, the intro. Yep. Yep. Yep. It is absolutely perfect. It just showed up like a gift from the gods in our group chat DM on Twitter and I felt the need to take it and put it in as the new podcast intro, so There it is. And yeah so pro tip though, if you are an aspiring podcaster, when you have more than two people on a podcast one thing that you can do, boys and girls at home, is you can tell everybody ” Let’s just let there be long awkward silences that way nobody’s talking over one another” and then you just remove them afterwards. And you know if we were more professional we wouldn’t be talking about this behind the scenes stuff during the actual episode this is just how it fucking goes. So anyways into the actual meat and potatoes. We’ve got something very important to discuss because this is something actually I’ve been leveraging with Chaser Chat, if you have been seeing any of the images that I’ve been creating for episodes that I’ve been releasing. And just some of the shitposting I’ve been doing on my personal account.

[00:03:36] Artificial Intelligence is, of course, taking over. I recently started a business at the beginning of January that’s focused around artificial intelligence, and lots of people are talking about this. It is quite possibly going to be the hottest topic in the weather sphere of 2024. So I’m going to go ahead and throw this over to Alferi- I’m sorry, Algeria to start, because this is something I think runs very close to a thread that he is often talking about, which is copyright, DMCA, people getting credit. My dude, what do you think about the fact that, potentially in the future, the content is gonna look so damn close to real life, that people aren’t even gonna need to get footage from anyone anymore?

[00:04:20] Alferia: So I think the first step is the one that the one that’s already there, which is these scam channels with ” Top 10 tornado intercepts!” That it’s like stuff from the 1980s, right? But they say it’s 2023 and I’m like, bro, I can tell that this was recorded on an actual potato. Is that they like, now those channels are getting, they get the TikTok male AI voice that says did you know that every 60 seconds, a minute passes in Africa stuff like that.

[00:04:49] Gabriel: I don’t even know what you’re talking about right now, but it’s funny. So keep going.

[00:04:53] Alferia: And so what they do is that they grab a bunch of footage. They don’t even ask for it. They just steal it all at once an hour’s worth of footage. And then for the first three minutes, it is. I haven’t checked verbatim, but it’s probably verbatim, the introductory paragraph from Wikipedia. And then they just play 50 minutes of stolen content. One of those channels did one on Moore ’99, a couple months after I released mine. That one has over double the views of my video, which, by the way, I spent, I think about, two weeks straight looking into and not even looking not only looking into but spending $250 to get GR2 to get radar loops on my own now.

[00:05:33] Gabriel: Is that just so you don’t have to deal with anybody saying that you took gasp a radar loop from them?

[00:05:40] Alferia: If they pull that card i’m just gonna say it’s literally public domain shut up.

[00:05:44] Gabriel: Right.

[00:05:44] Cassie: That’s brainless, too. That’s absolutely brainless.

[00:05:46] Alferia: There’s that side of it. And in terms of what I want from that side is, They are out there. They are getting a lot of views from people who actually, and they’re also guiding themselves. They’re trying to protect themselves under fair use, but there’s no commentary for 50 minutes of your video. And I’m no lawyer, I know, surprise, the 21 year old is not a copyright lawyer. But, based on the precedent from what the YouTube, some of the YouTube cases, the Ethan Klein case is the one that I basically default to, right? The reason why that was declared fair use was that it was- Even though it didn’t fit all the criteria for fair use, it was transformative. And that was the sort of key factor that the judge ruling on the case said, that it was fair use. Context, completely different, but there’s nothing being transformed here. It’s all AI slop, and people are falling for it. Now here’s where I come in and say that there is no hope for that. Which is that, it’s slowing down partially because they realize, oh wait, I can still get claimed for this. And in terms of the AI storm chasing thing here’s my view on AI as a whole. It is a helpful tool, nothing more. It is not a replacement. If you use it as a replacement in a couple years, you are going to regret it because it will likely… and here’s the deal, right? And I said this a lot and you see this a lot with new technology, they’re like, oh, this is going to kill something and then it doesn’t really kill it. It may become more popular. It may become better, but there are still people who use they’re like, Windows, for example, right? Like Windows 11 is a new best thing. I haven’t upgraded to Windows 11. I’m still on Windows 10, and I know that’s drastically different context there, but what I’m getting at here is that if AI is used as a tool, used for illustrating something that otherwise cannot really be illustrated, like there’s literally nothing you can base it on? Then yes. As long as you declare that it’s AI, run with the wind with it. If it’s used for construction, let’s just say there’s literally nothing that describes what you’re saying. Nothing whatsoever. Then maybe get your chip in a, get a dip in AI and see what happens when it comes to the content creation side of things, there’s a lot of people that will use AI because straight up, they’re lazy and don’t want to pay people.

[00:08:01] Gabriel: Yes.

[00:08:02] Alferia: There’s the other side of it, of where, I think there were people that who use AI to get an idea of what they want a character to look like before they commission an artist. They aren’t going to use it, but they use it to get an idea, to give it to the artist, say, “Hey, something like this”, and then that’s whatever they go from there, just to get a very basic character design going, right? Because not everyone’s a born artist, but in terms of this other stuff regarding AI stuff, Here’s the issue, and this is where things are really starting to get into the, also the tech side of things, which is that… when it comes to the people who are going to be creating these AI videos, they aren’t going to have an idea of what the hell they’re doing, right? Accuracy, be damned. And as great and as phenomenal as, I guess we’ve seen it with Twisters, right? The Tornado CGI in that is some of the best CGI we’ve seen with weather, period. It’s going to take a really damn long time for AI to get there. And we’ve seen these AI videos come out and out. The problem that I think, and the reason why it’s currently in a beta phase is that I feel like that it’s going to be hitting a brick wall. And really all I can say to people in terms of chasing, if people are going to use AI for chasing, here’s the good news for you. I’m not sure what the outcome of the case is, but I know that one of the AI image generators got sued by Getty Images. You don’t screw with Getty Images. And also I hate Getty Images, but that’s for a completely separate reason.

[00:09:37] You don’t screw around with Getty Images because they will come for you. I forgot if it’s settled, but I think it was settled in Getty Image’s favor. Correct me if I’m wrong with this in the comments or whatever. So there’s that going for people. The other sort of, I guess you could say, thing for chasers Is in terms of it replacing chaser content. Oh boy. That’s- I don’t think that’s happening. Do I think it’s scary as it is right now? Yes. Do I think it’s going to replace it? Hell no. There are some-

[00:10:05] Gabriel: Don’t you, let me just interject here for a second. Don’t you think though, that those same channels you were talking about, whether it’s on YouTube or TikTok that if they have the ability, instead of ripping other people’s footage and trying to pass it off as their own, they could, if the AI video generation gets good enough, they could just create these videos out of whole cloth, pass it off as actual chasing stuff. Cause you know, you just said that people aren’t going to know what the hell they’re doing. That goes for the general public as well. You’re general backscroller. They’re not going to know the difference between whether or not the hook echo is oriented the right direction or whether or not the occlusion is facing the right way. And they might start paying off these accounts that are posting this footage thinking that it’s actual real storm chasing footage.

[00:10:48] Kay: Hey everyone, Kay here from Rough Skies Ahead and Chaser Chat. I wanted to give a quick shout out to the new Chaser Chat YouTube page, where you can find all your favorite episodes uploaded in video form with a transcription to follow along with. The link is in the podcast description.

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[00:11:35] Alferia: And that’s where, right now, there are guardrails that are trying, key word is trying, to be put in place of saying, “Oh, this is AI content” and what isn’t. Again, the problem is that the way that this is being implemented is the same way that YouTube’s demonetization policies are, which is machine learning, which means the first year and a half to three years is going to be utter hell and chaos.

[00:11:59] Gabriel: Yes.

[00:12:00] Alferia: Because again, that’s just how machine learning works. YouTube’s demonetization guidelines, they’re still very weird, but they’re much more lenient now than they were when it first launched. When it comes to the sort of AI thing, I feel like what’s really here is that, yes, that means something along the lines of, Oh, what about the, the footage of the monetary gains. It’s think about who the people who buy your licenses are, right? News corporations, stuff like that. Do I think, and maybe this is me putting too much faith in news corporations and big businesses, but do I think that they would be low enough considering how much these, the anchors on a lot of these agencies say that they are against AI right now would choose AI video of a literal stationary tornado over your footage which shows it moving? Right now the answer is, they’re gonna pick you. I can’t say that for the future, because I can’t predict the future, funnily enough, I don’t have that ability yet. But when it comes to how I feel like this is being used, Right now, in terms of the chaser side of things, Right now I haven’t seen it much, and I’m hoping it stays that way. And if it doesn’t there’s a pretty good chance that these entities are being trained on your stuff. And we’ll see how, again, what happens from there.

[00:13:27] Gabriel: All right, Cassie, let me throw it over to you for a second. Because I think Alferia touched on some good points and just taking it maybe a step further than what he was saying, do you think that there’s going to be a day in the future where somebody is going to be able to generate footage of a tornado where it looks similar enough to the location that people are currently chasing in, and they’re going to get somebody to actually pay them for that footage. It’s going to make its way onto like a newscast or an online media aggregate, and then they’re going to realize that was a tornado that didn’t even actually happen.

[00:14:00] Cassie: I’d say that could, I see that becoming an issue within the next two to four years. Right now that technology is not widely available. Not the technology we’ve seen do the cool movie scenes and shit like that. But it’s not widely available, but I do see it becoming a problem. I guess from I have to look at AI from both a I’m saying this a real life and a chaser life standpoint. 50 50 on the whole AI thing. I use AI daily at work and it’s made my job a billion times easier. I if you receive an email from me at work, it’s AI generated. Same thing with all my advertisements and stuff like that. When it comes to photography and video though, it does give me the heebie jeebies. Just because what is the point in trying to make money off of footage that can be make money off footage that can be acquired cheaper, generated by AI. And I know that for some people in our community that’s our main source of income. And here in the next two to four years it’s looking, unless like regulations are placed, it’s looking People can start generating AI chase videos and pass them off. And I don’t want to say, chasing footage would become obsolete because it won’t it would just be easier for, new stations to acquire footage that’s AI generated and cheaper, more than likely.

[00:15:18] Gabriel: And just to follow along with that thread even a little bit more, so it’s going to be funny the first time somebody actually sells their AI generated storm chasing footage to a network. And we’re all going to have a good laugh about that because ha, those idiots got duped, et cetera, et cetera. I think the real defining moment, if you want to call it like the inflection point with the AI generated content is going to be when, cause right now we have spotters who will log onto spotter network and they will report a fucking tornado when there’s not actually one. And they’ll give the false report-

[00:15:52] Alferia: Or hear me out, they go to Wiener, Arkansas and say that their balls hurt.

[00:15:56] Gabriel: Yes that they also do that.

[00:15:58] Alferia: But that is one of my favorite spotter reports of all time and it is peak comedy.

[00:16:04] Gabriel: It is peak comedy. But I think it’s going to actually cut- I think all of this is gonna come to a head. If I had to make a prediction and maybe it is complete bollocks and doesn’t ever come to fruition. But if I had to make a prediction, I think that all of this artificial intelligence stuff and how it intertwines with the storm chasing community will come to a head when somebody creates a super realistic looking tornado video hitting like a town or something near where there is actually like a hook echo and there are chasers, you know, congregated around an area waiting for a tornado to happen. And then the National Weather Service actually issues a warning. PDS tornado emergency, something like that, based off of that video. That’s my prediction as to where it’s actually going to become a big enough problem that, like Alferia was talking about earlier, they’re going to have to fast track regulation and basically make it. I would think at some point submitting, submitting a false report in the form of AI generated video would actually become like a federal crime.

[00:17:03] Alferia: Submitting a false report in general is a federal crime because you are submitting a false report to a federal governmental agency.

[00:17:10] Gabriel: Okay, I didn’t know that was actually a federal crime.

[00:17:12] Cassie: I’m just, I’m already feeling bad for the poor National Weather Service Mets that have to go out to a town that’s apparently been leveled, and they get there, and they’re just like, huh? Because nothing happened. It was AI.

[00:17:23] Alferia: I also want to point out that AI has been around for quite some time, because you mentioned it, that you use it at work. It’s been used all the time, in terms of stuff like, robocalls, technically, can be considered a form of AI. Automated messaging. If you say something and automatically it happens, and I guess even then you could really branch out and say video game CPUs-

[00:17:43] Gabriel: I think more specifically, like for this conversation, we’re talking about generative AI.

[00:17:49] Alfera: Yeah. Yeah. Generative AI. And when it comes to that, it’s been here for a while. In fact, DALL-E, right? I forgot exactly what it was. It was sometime between 2020, 2022 where you would just put something in it, it would give you an image out, right?

[00:18:04] Gabriel: And they were the craziest fucking images you’ve ever seen.

[00:18:08] Cassie: Yeah.

[00:18:08] Alferia: Like John Oliver-

[00:18:09] Cassie: He’s eating spaghetti and they’re Yeah. People weren’t using it maliciously then.

[00:18:14] Alferia: And I remember very well, there was a, I don’t know if it was web exclusive or not, but there was part of an episode from last week tonight with John Oliver where they made him marry a head of lettuce. It was one of the funniest bits from that show, period. And I feel like it just comes down to how generative AI is done. I feel like it’s going through the technology loop now where, oh, this is really fun. People screw around with it and then people try and do something nefarious with it. And then regulations are then put in place to, I slow it down or whatnot, which doesn’t fully eliminate the problem, but limits it.

[00:18:56] Gabriel: I would agree with that. And the last thing I want to mention before we see our way out of this conversation is obviously the biggest problem with artificial intelligence right now on everyone’s mind is deepfake porn. And I’m just saying, I think Deep Fake storm chasing could be a problem. Imagine if you actually take your rival storm chaser your nemesis, and you make them zero meter a storm, and then you start spreading dirty rumors about how they are an unsafe chaser. Hey, could you so could you imagine if you just deep faked Brandon Copic’s SUV, just flying down the wrong side of the road, passing up cars. And then you tweeted it out and you were just like, look at this asshole. He’s driving so unsafe, like Radar Omega, you should immediately terminate your contract with him. I’m not encouraging anybody to do that. But these are the places that my mind is going when I’m thinking about this stuff because I’m like, two to four years, like you said, Cassie, these tools not widely available to the public right now, but in two to four years, you’re going to have the ability to use a tool like Sora on your mobile device as you’re walking around. And so I think that there are a whole host of problems. So I want to thank you both for joining me here today for this conversation.

[00:20:05] Alferia: One, one last thing I want to say on this.

[00:20:09] Gabriel: Okay, of course.

[00:20:10] Alferia: I know what you’re really scared of, Gabe.

[00:20:12] Gabriel: Okay…

[00:20:12] Alferia: Deep fake videos of your feet.

[00:20:14] Gabriel: Thank you all for listening to this episode of the Chaser Chat WX Drama Report. We’ll talk to you later. Bye.

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