Humans Are Being Hired to Make AI Slop Look Less Sloppy (nbcnews.com)
- Reference: 0178958832
- News link: https://slashdot.org/story/25/08/31/2216231/humans-are-being-hired-to-make-ai-slop-look-less-sloppy
- Source link: https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/humans-hired-to-fix-ai-slop-rcna225969
> Such gigs are part of a new category of work spawned by the generative AI boom that threatened to displace creative jobs across the board: Anyone can now write blog posts, produce a graphic or code an app with a few text prompts, but AI-generated content rarely makes for a satisfactory final product on its own... Fixing AI's mistakes is not their ideal line of work, many freelancers say, as it tends to pay less than traditional gigs in their area of expertise. But some say it's what helps pay the bills....
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> As companies struggle to figure out their approach to AI, recent data provided to NBC News from freelance job platforms Upwork, Freelancer and Fiverr also suggest that demand for various types of creative work surged this year, and that clients are increasingly looking for humans who can work alongside AI technologies without relying on or rejecting them entirely. Data from Upwork found that although AI is already automating lower-skilled and repetitive tasks, the platform is seeing growing demand for more complex work such as content strategy or creative art direction. And over the past six months, Fiverr said it has seen a 250% boost in demand for niche tasks across web design and book illustration, from "watercolor children story book illustration" to "Shopify website design." Similarly, Freelancer saw a surge in demand this year for humans in writing, branding, design and video production, including requests for emotionally engaging content like "heartfelt speeches...."
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> The low pay from clients who have already cheaped out on AI tools has affected gig workers across industries, including more technical ones like coding. For India-based web and app developer Harsh Kumar, many of his clients say they had already invested much of their budget in "vibe coding" tools that couldn't deliver the results they wanted. But others, he said, are realizing that shelling out for a human developer is worth the headaches saved from trying to get an AI assistant to fix its own "crappy code." Kumar said his clients often bring him vibe-coded websites or apps that resulted in unstable or wholly unusable systems.
"Even outside of any obvious mistakes made by AI tools, some artists say their clients simply want a human touch to distinguish themselves from the growing pool of AI-generated content online..."
[1] https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/humans-hired-to-fix-ai-slop-rcna225969
not cheap, smart use (Score:2, Interesting)
The companies didn't "cheap out" on AI, they made a smart business decision to get the basics of the design done by using AI rather than paying pointlessly excessive amounts for a designer to do it, then get the arrtist or designer to polish what you want. This is intelligent use of the technology.
Re: (Score:2)
It might be more-intelligent to get the artist/designer involved in the early stages of AI production to streamline the process. That would, of course, require the designer to be more-realistic about the market value of their work. The days of companies paying design firms millions of dollars on new logos are (or at least should be) over.
Re: (Score:1)
true, what would be really intelligent would be if the designers and artists bit down on their pride and realised they could be the ones utilising the tools to produce very rapid prototypes to the customers at less cost.
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> It might be more-intelligent to get the artist/designer involved in the early stages of AI production to streamline the process.
Depends if you want creative direction or if you want to pay a fortune for someone to waste time coming up with ideas. I've worked with designers plenty of times. 99% of the time the first thing they ask is "what do you want it to look like".
If on the other hand you're paying a marketing firm to come up with a new logo you're off base. The "value" to the company is in the ideas that the marketing firm comes up with. The actual logo generation costs nothing, you part with millions of dollars that get paid to
Re:not cheap, smart use (Score:4, Interesting)
The fact that they're coming back to artists indicates they were winging it. Which is totally another way of saying they tried to cheap out. When the real costs of AI hit home those same customers will likely skip the AI step altogether.
Who might start to use future expensive "AI" art tools is the artists themselves.
Re: (Score:2)
So, you're saying it is the same successful approach as hiring a code monkey to vibe-code your first website and then when you hit a 100 users and it goes down, paying to a real developer to "fix" it?
I've seen this approach, it is very common, but that's the only thing it has going for it.
The beauty of AI (Score:3)
As.more people try to us AI for business, the more the demand for people to fix the junk it creates. People will always look for cheap way to do something and then pay to have the botched job fixed.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
It isn't botched jobs, what is being produced is prototypes, they don't need to be perfect. They get faster results that they can iterate on many times over without the very high costs. The artists then produce the final product. This is extremely intelligent use of AI and the artist. Sure the artist may not be happy, but the business gets better turn around at a lower cost.
Re: (Score:2)
It isn't botched jobs, it is botched prototypes, we get it.
Yes and no (Score:2)
The AI can do a bunch of prototyping work and then you call in the human to polish it.
But that is still a lot of work that a human being was previously doing. Now you can basically have a computer show you 20 or 30 different logos mocked up half-assedly and then pick the one you like. Before the AI you would have had to pay to have those logos mocked up.
The problem isn't that AI is going to replace all the jobs. Hell if it would replace all the jobs that would be just fine because we would have a po
Cracker Barrel Logo? (Score:2)
n/t
Re: (Score:2)
Nah that seems more the case of the company trying to rebrand itself in a desperate attempt to bolster revenue. Cracker Barrel has been in a painful decline for awhile, so they thought it might be a good idea to abandon their roots and take a stab at Starbucks (or whatever it was they thought they were doing). That blew up in their collective faces.
The message (Score:1)
The message I got from the article is that, according to those who write checks for services, a lot of people are not worth as much money as they seem to think they are.
From what I understand, this is quite common.
Re: (Score:1)
Thank you for your insights.....
Some prompts to fix the Will Smith video (Score:2)
How will she fix the Will Smith video? More AI? Here are some.prompt:
"Re-inflate those dimpled-in faces"
"Reduce length of those hands"
"Very few humans have six fingers. No one has seven"
"Set fawn level of placard messages to medium"
Re: (Score:2)
> "Very few humans have six fingers. No one has seven"
Hello. My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die!
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"Keep his wife's name out ya clanker mouth!"
If companies keep this up ... (Score:2)
> Humans Are Being Hired to Make AI Slop Look Less Sloppy
AI implemented to help/replace humans ... humans hired to help that AI ...
Reminds me of the [1]Better Off Ted [wikipedia.org] episode [2]Racial Sensitivity [fandom.com] (s1e4) where the company gets new motion sensors to control, basically, everything (lights, doors, elevators, water fountains, ...) but they work by detecting the light reflecting off people's skin -- and they don't detect black people. Solution? Rather than simply reverting to the previous sensors (and admit they made a mistake), management tries a few other things. Fir
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Better_Off_Ted
[2] https://betteroffted.fandom.com/wiki/Racial_Sensitivity
I don't know (Score:2)
I'm not an AI and you should see my post history. Absolute mess!
This is obvious use (Score:2)
AI is a tool, it belongs in a tool box along with other tools. Using it as a base is literally what people do, e.g.
I've used generative AI to workshop ideas for a logo and then manually fixed it up afterwards.
My wife used generative AI to generate math exams and then manually changed the numbers to that it makes sense.
At work I've used generative AI to prepare my mid-year review and then manually fixed it up afterwards.
This is literally what AI is for - a tool in our toolbox.
And people wonder why (Score:1)
Liberal arts and graphics arts programs at universities are being abandoned en masse. Fixing AI slop to pay the bills must be sooooooo rewarding for someone who had dreams of producing fine literature.
Re: (Score:2, Troll)
There's only so large of a market for fine literature or art. Commercial work is what you produce to pay the bills. At least there are options outside of a job at Starbucks.
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interesting comment, almost like you have never been to a concert, or play, or movie.
Re: (Score:2)
Interesting comment, Almost like you failed to realize all careers have failures and successes, where the failures tend to "struggle to put food on the table".
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you seem clueless, commercial art or boring drudgery is the vast majority of all art. Fine arts, acting etc are rounding errors in the industry. yes all industries have failure rates, but very few have failure rates where 99% of the time you are expected to fail.
Re: (Score:2)
75% of all statistics are made up.
Re: (Score:2)
Quite the contrary. Commercial art comprises the vast majority of artwork produced in any given year, especially today with all the corporate logos and advertising in production. Concerts and plays comprise a minority of the man hours (and now AI tokens) spent producing what can be lumped into the category of "art". And it is interesting that you mention concerts when so many concerts are just corpo-friendly schlock.
Re: (Score:2)
That is very wrong.
Re:And people wonder why (Score:4, Interesting)
It is actually spot on correct. My wife and my sister are both artists, both spend most of their time doing other things as fine art or musician is just not viable to live off for the vast majority of people. Most artists are doing things just to survive not to produce art.
Re: (Score:2)
So your source of knowledge is two people you know. Consider expanding your scope.
Re: And people wonder why (Score:2)
It's interesting because creating fine literature doesn't pay up front.
You'll spend years fine tuning your work, writing it, rewriting it while making no money from it. Why not work on fixing other peoples mess in the meantime and rake in the dough.
Dramatically lower pay (Score:2)
It is cross field here and not just due to AI
- Decades long employment drop, declining pay and lack of opportunities in news reporting, journalism and magazine writers
- Decline in advertising work, employment numbers and declining pay due to the internet changing commercial advertising
- Boomers declining as a percentage of the population as they were the last generation to grow up/keep up with a delivered daily newspaper, regular broadcast TV viewership, TV news viewership, supporting the symphony/opera/fin
Re: (Score:1)
I'm always amazed that people feel entitled to earn a living by doing something they enjoy, as opposed to something that someone else is willing to pay for.
I mean, I'd love to make a living by having sex with beautiful women. Unfortunately, I've yet to find anyone willing to pay me for doing so, not to mention finding a distinct lack of interest from beautiful women.
Why anyone feels they would be entitled to make a living at the "creative arts" simply because they'd like to do so is beyond me.