AI-generated 'Seinfeld' is every bit as gruesome as it sounds
The live streaming experience is entertaining, but not intentionally.
A new Twitch livestream attempts to answer the question: What if AI created Seinfeld endlessly? "Nothing, Forever" is an experiment using OpenAI's GPT-3 natural language model to produce (sometimes coherent) dialogue between the pixelated counterparts of Jerry, George, Elaine and Kramer. While it's closer to surreal performance art than the beloved '90s sitcom, it conjures up images of a weird, dystopian future where we're entertained with endless robot-generated content.
"Nothing, Forever" immediately hits you with a well-known aesthetic. Stage transitions show the exterior of a line of New York brownstones over the sound of an original jazz bass line. He frequently cuts to "Larry" (Jerry's equivalent) performing what the AI passes off as stand-up comedy. Scenes inside Larry's apartment show him chatting with George, Elaine, and Kramer's counterparts about mundane matters. Their conversations, while mostly unintelligible and devoid of structure or narrative, make their inspiration clear.
On the other hand, the stark, rudimentary character models sound like something out of a 1980s Sierra adventure game. Their voices are also robotic, and Jerry and George sound less like their real-world counterparts and more like Mr. Van Driessen, the hippie social studies teacher at Beavis & Butthead. Finally, it's an overstatement to say that the dialogue generated is coherent - much less funny. (If it weren't for its laugh track, you wouldn't notice the laugh lines.) The current limitations of generative AI are as much on display as the show's influence.
Twitch
"Apart from the artwork and the laugh track you'll hear," one of the show's creators posted on Reddit, "everything else is generative, including: the dialogue , speech, direction (camera cuts, character focus, shot length, scene length, etc.), character movement, and music." The stream has little human involvement and changes depending on the comments from viewers of the Twitch stream."The show can indeed change, and the narrative actually evolves based on the audience," Hartle said in an interview with Vice. we're considering is how to involve people in shaping the narrative so that it becomes their own."
That goal may be a long way off, as any story, let alone a personalized story, seems beyond its current capabilities. Yet with a big budget and several years of technological advancements, it's easy to imagine someone churning out more watchable generative programming, an endless stream of personalized digital media on the assembly line. “Our guiding principle was: can we create a show that can generate entertaining content forever? Because that's really where we see the future unfolding. Our goal with future iterations or future shows that we release is to trade a show that is like Netflix-level quality."
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The live streaming experience is entertaining, but not intentionally.
A new Twitch livestream attempts to answer the question: What if AI created Seinfeld endlessly? "Nothing, Forever" is an experiment using OpenAI's GPT-3 natural language model to produce (sometimes coherent) dialogue between the pixelated counterparts of Jerry, George, Elaine and Kramer. While it's closer to surreal performance art than the beloved '90s sitcom, it conjures up images of a weird, dystopian future where we're entertained with endless robot-generated content.
"Nothing, Forever" immediately hits you with a well-known aesthetic. Stage transitions show the exterior of a line of New York brownstones over the sound of an original jazz bass line. He frequently cuts to "Larry" (Jerry's equivalent) performing what the AI passes off as stand-up comedy. Scenes inside Larry's apartment show him chatting with George, Elaine, and Kramer's counterparts about mundane matters. Their conversations, while mostly unintelligible and devoid of structure or narrative, make their inspiration clear.
On the other hand, the stark, rudimentary character models sound like something out of a 1980s Sierra adventure game. Their voices are also robotic, and Jerry and George sound less like their real-world counterparts and more like Mr. Van Driessen, the hippie social studies teacher at Beavis & Butthead. Finally, it's an overstatement to say that the dialogue generated is coherent - much less funny. (If it weren't for its laugh track, you wouldn't notice the laugh lines.) The current limitations of generative AI are as much on display as the show's influence.
Twitch
"Apart from the artwork and the laugh track you'll hear," one of the show's creators posted on Reddit, "everything else is generative, including: the dialogue , speech, direction (camera cuts, character focus, shot length, scene length, etc.), character movement, and music." The stream has little human involvement and changes depending on the comments from viewers of the Twitch stream."The show can indeed change, and the narrative actually evolves based on the audience," Hartle said in an interview with Vice. we're considering is how to involve people in shaping the narrative so that it becomes their own."
That goal may be a long way off, as any story, let alone a personalized story, seems beyond its current capabilities. Yet with a big budget and several years of technological advancements, it's easy to imagine someone churning out more watchable generative programming, an endless stream of personalized digital media on the assembly line. “Our guiding principle was: can we create a show that can generate entertaining content forever? Because that's really where we see the future unfolding. Our goal with future iterations or future shows that we release is to trade a show that is like Netflix-level quality."
All products recommended by Engadget are selected by our editorial team, independent of our parent company. Some of our stories include affiliate links. If you purchase something through one of these links, we may earn an affiliate commission. All prices correct at time of publication.
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