“I heard you calling on the megaphone,” Taylor Swift begins on her 12th studio album, “The Life of a Showgirl.”
The album has been met with critiques and criticism since it was released Oct. 3; however, there is one booming message coming from that megaphone: Swift does not care about the negative impact of generative artificial intelligence unless her likeness is the focus.
In typical Swift fashion, she sent her fans searching across cities for QR codes linked to promotional videos and visuals for the album. These now private videos, which can still be found on Reddit, featured a squirrel with an extra limb and jumbled letters that failed to form real words. In other words, these videos featured telltale signs of generative AI use.
In 2023, scientist Shaolei Ren investigated the energy and water consumption required to maintain artificial intelligence in data centers. Ren and his team estimated“that to train the GPT-3 language model consumed hundreds of thousands of liters of fresh water.”
Swift’s decision to use generative AI instead of utilizing a real artist or someone on her team shows a disregard for the negative ramifications of generative AI. Not only does generative AI require large amounts of water, but the impact on electricity usage is also grim.
Data centers have 48% higher carbon intensity of electricity than the U.S. average.
“What is different about generative AI is the power density it requires,” Noman Bashir, computing and climate impact fellow at MIT Climate and Sustainability Consortium, said. “Fundamentally, it is just computing, but a generative AI cluster might consume seven or eight times more energy than a typical computing workload.”
Water and energy issues indirectly affect Swift, yet she made the conscious decision to use generative AI despite readily available research that highlights the use of vital resources to maintain these data centers. With a large platform and access to resources to educate herself, Swift’s selective concern is shameful.
Love her or hate her, Swift’s influence is large. Ahead of the 2024 presidential election, Swift posted her endorsement for Kamala Harris and urged her followers to register to vote. The result? Around 406,000 people clicked on the link she shared for voter registration resources 24 hours after the post was published.
In that same endorsement post, Swift called out an AI-generated video of her endorsing President Donald Trump.
“It really conjured up my fears surrounding AI, and the dangers of spreading misinformation,” Swift said in the post.
Although her new promotional videos do not directly spread false information, they are fake depictions. The use of generative AI in these videos, just one year after Swift’s admission of her fears about AI, sends a clear message: Swift only shows concerns when an issue directly impacts her and her image.
Swift’s use of generative AI undermines what the singer/songwriter sought out to achieve with her years-long “Taylor’s Version” project.
“Artists should own their own work for so many reasons,” Swift said in an Instagram post. “but the most screamingly obvious one is that the artist is the only one who really knows that body of work.”
Swift’s belief that artists should own their own work has not disappeared. Swift clearly believes she should own her own work; however, generative AI works use pre-existing data, meaning the visuals Swift created using generative AI include works previously produced by other people.
If one of the biggest pop stars in the world is using generative AI to promote her music, the future is bleak. If Swift, and her billion-dollar net worth, does not want to pay an artist to create an original work for her, the future for artists to use their imagination in creation is uncertain.
Swift’s alleged AI use opens the floodgates and sets a standard that employing generative AI tools over real, human artists for creative promotional material is OK.
The center of music and the music industry is human creativity. Musical artists, producers and record labels should not lose sight of this. AI use isn’t a cheap fix. The consequences of generative AI use are costing real people vital resources like water and energy.
Elizabeth Talaga is a junior studying journalism at Ohio University. Please note the views and opinions of the columnists do not reflect those of The Post. Have something to say? Email Elizabeth at et029322@ohio.edu.
