📓Creativ Brief: Machine Intelligence > Artificial Intelligence
WarnerBros Discovery splits. Amazon's robotic future. Entertainment industry shrinks. Creators wrestle with AI. Creativ in Cannes. Cannes GPT.
Hello from Paris, France. I arrived early to relax, adjust, and prep for Cannes Lions next week. If you’ll be at the festival, please reply to this email so we can link on the Croissette.
We don’t like the word artificial intelligence (AI) at Creativ Company.
It fails to accurately describe the innovation that the new technology brings to the human species.
Worse, AI has been ascribed so many applications that it has become generic, just like authenticity, data-driven, disruption, or a host of other meaningless but smart sounding jargon before it.
The technology is an algorithm, a mathematical equation that takes inputs, processes them in a manner it was trained to, and produces outputs.
You can think of it as a data sorting machine. In goes a prompt and out comes a poem, a gif of a kitty, an animation, an itinerary for a vacation, a design layout, a small clip of a comedian telling a joke about AI to an AI produced audience.
It’s magic, but it’s not. It’s new technology. Scary.
I imagine the inventor of fire had a hard time convincing other humans of the benefits. Some cooked food for the first time. Some inevitably burned their own house down.
You can design your mathematical equation to organize almost anything. That’s why repetitive, rote processes are very, very likely to be made obsolete.
Driving. Filing. Data entry. Call centers. Voice over. Ad operations. Factory work. Most Software engineers.
This new technology can do these jobs better than a human. And the amoral reality of capitalism is that it values the margins produced by robot slaves more than the human beings the same robots are meant to serve.
However, the upside is immense as well.
My aunt was (likely) cured of cancer this month due to the advances of the tech. Machine intelligence read the biometric data found on her DNA, in the cancer cells, allowing it to sequence a specific immunotherapy treatment bespoke to her body.
That’s amazing. That’s magic.
Artificial is a terrible word for this. Everything manmade is technically artificial.
These are machines. Intelligent machines that can solve our everyday problems through the application of mathematical models on the natural world.
We prefer the words, machine intelligence.
3 Stories Shaping the Media and Tech Industries
The streaming division would house HBO, Max, and Discovery+, while the other unit would contain Warner Bros. film and TV studios, cable channels like CNN and TNT, and could be sold to a major buyer such as Comcast.
Why it matters: The splitting of traditional cable assets and growing streaming assets is a major trend we identified would accelerate last year. Stagnant cable assets that still generate cash will be spun into conglomerates to produce cash for private equity. Streaming assets will become bundled to attract growth capital and younger audiences. Expect other major media firms like Disney and ViacomCBS to do the same soon.
This group aims to enhance existing single-task warehouse bots with flexible abilities—like unloading trailers, retrieving parts, and responding to verbal instructions—while also rolling out generative-AI mapping tools and even prototype glasses to improve delivery logistics.
Why it matters: AI-driven robotics have transformed supply chains across the globe already. Amazon has the largest distribution centers across the United States. The firm’s further investment in robotics aims to build a foundational layer of how global tech and commerce companies operate.
Paramount Global is laying off 3.5% of its U.S. workforce—several hundred employees—as part of ongoing cost-cutting efforts tied to the decline of traditional pay-TV and broader economic challenges. The move follows an earlier 15% reduction last year and comes amid the company’s pending merger with Skydance Media, which has been delayed due to legal disputes involving CBS.
Why it matters: Major media players are downsizing. The cuts are industry wide, accelerating instability across legacy entertainment giants and causing downstream effects on suppliers and service providers for these firms. Writers, actors, producers, grips, catering, are all feeling the effects.
Creativ Spotlight - Creativ Company at Cannes
Sara Yazdani, our VP of comms, and I will be attending Cannes Lions Festival of Creativity from June 15th to June 20th, with a host of cool media and advertising clients. Clients attending include virtual product placement firm Ryff, commercial production company 1stAveMachine, AI agency SpecialGuestX, and the world's largest robot fighting league NHRL.
Please respond to this email if you’ll be attending. We’d be happy to invite you out to one of the many events we’re supporting.
Stat of the Week - Creators and Influencers are Conflicted over How AI is Impacting their Work
Creators have mixed feelings on how AI will affect their work. 43% of creators and influencers in North America say AI tools help streamline their workflow.
Meanwhile, 30% report no noticeable impact, and smaller groups point to both benefits like accessibility (23%). However, almost 40% of responses cite challenges like increased competition (21%) or visibility issues due to biased algorithms (18%).
Creators are split on whether AI is a tool, a threat, or just background noise. Truthfully, it’s all of the above.
One Fun Thing - Cannes GPT
There’s hundreds of corporate events occurring in just four days at Cannes. It can feeling overwhelming. Luckily one intrepid AI soul fed an entire list of events into ChatGPT to create, Cannes GPT, an interactive chatbot that can answer questions about the festival.