IT Essentials: Who’s the real villain?
Guns don’t kill people, and AI doesn’t steal IP
Don't blame AI for doing what it was designed to do.
My wife and I have been playing a lot of Split Fiction recently, a co-op game that takes you to a variety of sci-fi and fantasy worlds. My character, Zoe, is the author of the fantasy side of the adventure, while my wife plays sci-fi writer Mio.
The two are trapped inside a machine that tries to suck all the original ideas out of their heads and use them to build a host of virtual worlds. The aim is, of course, to stop that from happening and protect Zoe and Mio’s original IP.
Are you drawing any parallels yet? The messaging from Hazelight Studios – which also developed titles like Magicka and It Takes Two – is not subtle, and I’m far from the first to note the game’s supposed anti-AI messaging. That’s despite the head of Hazelight, Josef Fares, being far from critical about the technology.
The machine that Zoe and Mio are trapped inside isn’t actually the game's antagonist; it’s just doing what it was built to do. The villain is actually J.D Vance Rader, a tech CEO and creativity vampire who is trying to automate creativity. Or, as he puts it:
"You narrow-minded amateurs can't understand the majesty of what I'm trying to do here."
Anyone else get Musk vibes?
A critique of AI’s endless appetite is just one read of Split Fiction’s message, but in my opinion it comes out harder against corporate greed, monopolies and business leaders so divorced from reality they get lost looking for their moral compass.
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