The Cancellation of Hank Green & Why Gen Z Hates Ai

23:41Samir Chaudry:I love that. Yeah. I absolutely love that. And I think that's why Hank, to me, is fine. But I understand where younger people have not had the opportunity, potentially, to fully develop their own thoughts and world without the ease of a thought being developed for them. I'm going to make a relationship to something that you may think is crazy really quickly. Liverking. Remember that guy? You're right. I do think that's crazy. You ever like everyone saw his abs? Yes. And his abs were like, whoa, he does this method and that's how he gets them. And then it came out, he was taking steroids. Yeah.

24:19Samir Chaudry:To me, that feels like a very equivalent conversation that like, you're like, oh yeah. Like you didn't earn that. Earning an original thought is a fascinating thing here that is actually what this is about right any original thought needs to have been earned i agree with that and i a hundred percent am in on maybe we have this relationship because we've been creators for 37 years without this technology i shot with vhs cameras i write in a journal i know how to do the other thing yeah and i've gone through the pain that is that other thing. So I now when I see something, I can immediately assign good, bad to it because I know if it actually includes the artistic process or not.

25:06The thing that gives me like that made me disappointed about the backlash to Hank's situation was that people wanted honesty from him and then he gave it to them. He said very candidly, this is what I'm doing. I'm so sorry if this is not what you wanted from me. I'm sorry if I let you down. This is how I use it in my process. He outlined Complexly's very clear AI policy that has been in place for over three years. This is not something that was made yesterday. I read through it. They never use it to generate anything like their scripts. They never use it to generate video or images from non-consensual LLMs, meaning any like public one, chat, GBT, clawed Gemini they use it on like a closed loop with consensual images um and the backlash still persisted and that makes me really disappointed because you want honesty from your creator you got it and I think you could choose at that point to engage or not engage with their content if that policy is up to your standards but I think the continued backlash against Hank after he's come through and explained his side of things is completely uncalled for.

26:21Samir Chaudry:There's been like a complete unwillingness to engage in the nuance of this. Exactly. I think that it opens us up to an opportunity like reading Complexly's AI policy. I actually thought was really interesting. It's very simple. It's one page. We'll link it so you guys can read or just look it up. Complexly AI policy. It's basically a Google doc that maps out like four rules. And I think what would be a really healthy discussion, and we'll start it here, but I think it should take place in the comments. It should take place as a discourse amongst creators is what is our YouTube creator or creator AI policy?

26:56Samir Chaudry:And we should collectively create it. Like what are the principles in which we will be using or not using AI moving forward? I'll throw out a line. Okay. The line is wherever the audience notices. Did you write that? Yeah. You think I like using Ellen to write that? I can't trust anything you said. How are we ranking it? Are we going to go like green, yellow, red? So, I mean, that's an interesting one right there. Say it again. The line is wherever the audience notices. No. I think that's the correct functional take because we can talk about like theoretical whether it's fine or not. But if people don't notice, then it's fine.

27:39Samir Chaudry:Like it's effectively fine because that's like what we know of all of the YouTubers. Does that mean if I use it to write my script and no one knows, then that's within your parameter that you just set? That's what he's saying. Yeah. Yeah. Yellow. Yellow leaning red on that. For me, it's about are you using AI for something that someone on your team could be doing? So the morality is around human resource. Let's say I have audio that's messed up and I want to use Adobe Podcast to fix it. I don't know how to fix that audio. This AI can fix the audio. I've now outsourced a skill to a machine. I guess I meant in the generative AI.

28:24Is that generative AI? I don't know. Yeah. So that's green, right? Because let's say you're a smaller creator you don't know how to edit you don't you have a crappy mic like you can't afford a 400 mic it makes it sound better right versus a thumbnail let's say you have a thumbnail and there's like a really neat detail in it like a really artistic detail and if you're a scroller you'd be like wow like somebody put that there like i wonder what that represents in this art

28:50Samir Chaudry:i have a i have a follow-up there because you started that with saying you're a small creator and that affordability aspect is interesting. Why does that, does it change if you're a bigger creator or like, let's say a YouTuber dubbing videos versus a large Netflix production using it to dub in a foreign language? Where's the line there? I think there's a question of effort for one. And there's also like budget is part of it, but it's like, if you're Mr. Beast and you have like dozens of thumbnails that you need to be like, you need made, right? He makes like a hundred per video. like generally an AI thumbnail is not as good as a man-made thumbnail it's generally like 85 percent you can put that effort to get to that next level and also like when there's a human making it I think there's more odds of you making something new and you someone's learning we're back to like the original frame that you put forward is morality yeah I'm gonna paint one more picture here is they have a real life scenario for a long period of time we dubbed our videos in partnership with 11 labs which is an ai voice company we dubbed them into multiple languages we wanted to do that with uh human actors the way that beast did it we got a quote for one of our videos because it was almost two hours long for 230 000 to dub it into uh 10 languages which is a lot of money Those are real human voice actors.

30:16Samir Chaudry:The choice we made was to use 11 labs to dub it into all of those languages through AI voice. Yeah. I mean, how much was 11 labs? I mean, nominal compared. I don't remember the price, but in the hundreds of dollars. I mean, yeah. I think the AI dubbing, like that's bread, right? That's red? That is bread, right? But the thing is, it's like, wait, wait, that's red? Bread, bread, bread. like it's bread like it's expensive like it's a lot of money oh it's bread wow okay got it yeah yeah i see yeah yeah so i think for one right if you go down the spectrum it's gonna sound like we're coping really hard at a certain point like that's just how it is right i've used ai too right it's how we all function i think it's just like when it's used for something that you know the person could have made themselves it's like you are a child just you were lazy you are a loser just make it yourself if you can make it yourself it's like there isn't the reason there's no nuance take is because nobody is thinking about that's respect not morality right like that's artistic respect which i agree with but morality is a different thing yeah and and i'm i'm again i'm i'm pushing to push the conversation forward not to and i i appreciate the push because i i can't transcribe every audio file that i do i don't trust you anymore you don't why you just said I appreciate it.

31:39Samir Chaudry:Yeah. Where'd you get that line? Did I actually? I didn't trust you at all. Yeah. Yeah. That's crazy. You said I'm pushing back and I appreciate it. Where's the script, Sid? Oh my God. It's literally Sid GPT. Holy shit. Okay. So I know Connor, you have some scenarios. Yeah. So I have some scenarios. I think what would be super helpful is we just go through, talk about whether or not we think a specific scenario is okay. And hopefully by the end, we can come up with like three principles that we agree on for I don't know if ethical is the right word, but like how creators can go about using AI in a way that they feel good about it.

32:15Samir Chaudry:Okay. Creator makes a generated thumbnail background and person, but they use their own face and manually Photoshop it back on green, red, or yellow. Red. Uh, yellow. I'm full green here. Yeah. I think for me, I mean, I, I know this is happening at scale with a lot of people and creators I respect. And I think there's still a level of, I don't know, they're doing it. They're concepting it. I'm watching them do it. I think as long as the image, and this is just more of a preference thing, as long as the thumbnail and the image accurately represents what's inside the video, I have no problem. I think generally we're moving in a direction where even me as an audience member, I prefer like a photo.

32:59Samir Chaudry:We've been talking about that a lot more. It's like, I want a lower thigh thumbnail because everyone can do that. It now looks homogenous. Like you want to have to ask the question when I see a thumbnail, is that the real environment? Yeah. So that to me again, it's like the line is wherever the audience notices. Right. If I don't notice and I click and the video backs it up, I have no problem. But with thumbnails, if you think about it though, they have been looking fake for a while. People have been editing to look fake, which is just, it's interesting. It's interesting how people are torn on it.

33:32Also, like both of us have the utmost respect for thumbnail designers.

33:36Samir Chaudry:I mean, we employ thumbnail designers. We pay a lot of money for thumbnail designers. And to be clear, we pay them partly in large part for their strategy, knowing also that they are using AI tools to make thumbnails for us better than we could use those tools. What if someone uses AI to create an outline for a video that they go and fill out or script themselves? Red. Yellow. I'm fully green here. I think getting an outline, this is something I do. Or I ask, how would you approach this? What are the holes in my story? That is something I do. That was my job before I got here is I was a researcher, outliner, scripter for commentary YouTube channels.

34:23And it was a very like sparse job. Like not a lot of people had that job. But I was this was like pre-chat GPT. And I was like really grateful because that's that's how I ended up here in this room. Right. And I think that is something that someone could do for. I was not being paid a lot for that. Very cheap. And didn't take me very long.

34:43Samir Chaudry:yeah but isn't it isn't it just like though but if that's bad it's bad like if you go on linkedin right now like 75 of the content is written by an llm and it's bad and 70 are yours it's actually why i post so little because i'm so i look at that environment and i'm like i have to work on an original thought and take to add to this ecosystem and like so many people are just cranking posts out there but they're bad. Like they're not fun to read. Those people don't have their own personal taste, LLM aside or not. They don't have a taste that aligns with yours. They don't have a DOD or opinion. But then it makes it uninteresting to read.

35:22Samir Chaudry:So let's try and bring this all together and brainstorm. Are there like three clear principles or rules that we can follow as we're thinking about how we use AI or how other creators can use AI in their process? let's start with like ideation yeah brainstorming let's say uh you know i'm trying to make a video about hank green this video i need a hundred title options for for this this episode yeah so the way i've used it in my uh like for most tragedy things it can help you get the ball rolling it very if you ask it to generate 500 titles you will probably get one that is half usable but it's a good way to give you ideas.

36:07So it's like, I need a good adjective here. So that's okay. Ideation.

36:11Samir Chaudry:Okay. What can we boil that down into like, what, what is that? Yeah. What does that represent? What's the principle? Is it like support AI as supporting character is okay? I think one of the issues here is that like, for a lot of us that grew up on YouTube, like the beauty of it is an individual out of their bedroom who cares so deeply about something. and the only resource they have is themselves and a camera and their own thoughts and they will do whatever it takes to get it out into the world. And now that is just changing drastically. Like there is something now - That has been changing through the lens of like the mainstreamification of YouTube, the commodification of video.

36:53Totally, that's happening with AI or not. Like the pure presence of a Mr. Beast is a sign of how things have changed since then.

37:02Samir Chaudry:We were two guys who made videos in your car. We now have a team. We employ a bunch of people. We are continuously hiring more people. We run a business now. And I think that is also probably some of the emotional feeling towards YouTube is the change from individual to media company that we're watching at the same time because that encourages a higher level of efficiency, which then in turn encourages a productization of something. And efficiency, getting back to the Hank Green situation, is a lot of the problem, I think, for a lot of his audience. That all of the sudden, the methods that he used to create the video make the video feel like a checked box on a checklist.

37:41Right. That he's checking off instead of a deep-rooted personal desire to share.

37:46Samir Chaudry:So that, to me, is number one principle, if we were to boil it down. It's like honesty, for me, is what is breaking through and what's interesting on YouTube, in culture, across the board. Like be honest and being honest can be like being honest about your use, but being honest also about like making something you want to make. And I think that's like, cause if it's something I really want to make and I get help from people in this room, plus organize those thoughts through an LLM and then deliver it through my honest lens. To me, if I'm on the receiving end of that, I'm okay with it. I'm okay if you're delivering me something that you honestly want to make.

38:27I completely agree. I think disclosure as much as you can, like without giving away your business secrets or whatever. But I think disclosing to your audience how much AI you're using and when, whenever possible is really important because then your audience can decide, do I want to engage with this person based on what I'm hearing? I don't think that would change your viewership at all. And you are very honest about how you use AI. I would almost feel bizarre, though, if a creator I'm watching is like, by the way, I used a color grading software that used AI to tell me how to color grade this.

39:06Samir Chaudry:Like, I would be like. I think it's just norms. Like, you know, you know, when Renegade went on TikTok and everyone like did not credit the original. I think the DC, like the dance creds thing that emerged as a norm on TikTok. I could see something similar happening like LLM creds or like where like what tools did I use in this video? I could see something similar to that emerging. Now, we're not going to probably list off that. Like, we're probably not going to put in the footer like Riverside used for transcription of every newsletter. but I think when it's like thumbnail made in part by Nano Banana.

39:49Samir Chaudry:Do you want me to put that for Photoshop too? Or your expectation wouldn't be there if I was using Photoshop? This is why I'm like disclosure when you can. Or like disclosure when you feel like it's necessary. And that's why, honestly, unfortunately, the whole episode is about to boil down to it depends. It depends. That's the answer. That is the answer. Which to me, I think is a good outcome. Yeah. If we can agree that there is a level of nuance and this is new and we're all figuring this out together. And like as creators, if we, you know, again, like with Hank, what my issue with the subject matter is, is when morality is placed on it.

40:29Samir Chaudry:Morality and like that to me feels like a different thing than like, yeah, I'm doing something. I'm doing too much. Right. Because I think it's like, yeah, all of a sudden these tools are allowing us to do more. but we're all probably making worse stuff if we're doing more, if we're driving efficiency, not through our honesty, it's just going to be worse stuff. So let's pull back to like what we can do that's good and honest because that has always broken through, but we're in a totally new era. And so like we're figuring it out together. And I think the audience and people who are watching, listening right now play a role in figuring this out with us.

41:06Samir Chaudry:And like the malicious intent or the assumption of malicious intent is where I'm like, that to me, I know, we know many of the top creators on YouTube. It is very hard for me to stand here and go like, they have malicious intent or some immorality in their use of technology. I think though, my counter to this whole AI, can you tell, can you not tell? I want to ask both Samir and Colin this. Do you guys not think that it is Oro when you watch a video and the first thing that comes up on the screen is none of the assets in this video were made using AI. Does that not make you feel like, yo, this is like you're watching.

41:48That's a Gen Z thing. That's a generational thing because I feel that. So I will say, Keish, like for me personally, that is a storytelling device. Yes. Like, you know, Andreas Hamm, incredible filmmaker, made a great video where he did that. He said, none of this is made with AI. I am now using that as a lens to enjoy the video in a different way as I see the shots that he made. So would you still feel the same things you feel when you watched a Natalie Lin video if it was made with AI? Because most of those videos are so personal. Or a Casey Neistat video.

42:22Samir Chaudry:No, but I don't think that's possible, personally. If it's becoming possible and I don't notice, you know, like, I don't know. But at that presently, I don't believe is possible. That like what Natalie has is honesty. She's telling an honest story. Now in five years or three years, do we get to a point? Like maybe, but I think as humans, we have a really good detection right now of like when someone's telling an honest story or not. Like, I just don't believe it's possible. Show me a video that feels like that, that, that. Well, that's the thing. You wouldn't know. Like you wouldn't know if you have watched a video.

43:00Samir Chaudry:Yeah, my argument is I think I would know. And then you've still felt the same sense of beauty and wonder at the end of the video. Yeah, it's not the same though. I'm going to bring us back into the principles a little bit. So number one, we have be honest in both how you're using AI and making something you want to make. I think the second principle is along what you said, that it should feel human to the point where it's indistinguishable. I think that is a big thing for me, whereas if I can have the same experience with or without knowing that it was made with AI, I think generally I'm okay with it.

43:36And I only say that because from my experience, similar to Samir, I've tried to be an early adopter and I've used AI to do different things. I used it to make graphics for the first video we made this year with James from Speed. And I'm someone who makes graphics. I'll make them in After Effects. So my line was, can I make this as good as, can I make this the way I want to make it regardless of the tool? And there was one graphic that got called out in that video in the comments a couple times. And I said, oh, okay, there's a line. I am not yet good enough at using this tool to make it indistinguishable for my audience.

44:14They are noticing that something is up. And that to me was the line. Not to say that I won't use it again when I get better. but I was like currently that's my line because I'm not as good as I should have been to make

44:26Samir Chaudry:sure it didn't impact the story yeah I think there's a level of like honest excitement too and like we have to put forward like we we've built multiple sites recently and like custom apps that I think are really cool like our site for Lexus for a Lexus campaign has this like the a Lexus car driving around as the cursor. Like that's built with AI. We just built a quiz for our channel and that's all built on Gemini. And it's super cool. And I have honest excitement to show this stuff to people. And I think that's a level too, where it's like, there's something about what happened with Hank that feels like he's doing something behind closed doors that he's ashamed of.

45:10Samir Chaudry:Right. And that's honest to him. And that's, yeah. And that's honest to him. There could have been a scenario where Hank said, I am using these and I'm going to continue to use them. Totally. Sorry that like you noticed this one and it didn't feel. Yeah. Can I ask a quick question from a brand perspective? If he said Claude or Gemini, would the world have a different reaction? Does the audience have a different reaction than ChachiPT? Yes. Yes. I think if he said Gemini, maybe not. If he said Claude, absolutely different. I think it is so interesting to me to see. Sorry. What did I? No, no, no.

45:42Keep going. That's fascinating. It is so interesting to me to see that these companies that are doing pretty much identical things, having identical environmental impacts. One of them doesn't place ads in its like free. Like I know Claude doesn't have ads. That's their whole thing, like in their prompted responses. I know that the free chat GPT does, if I'm not mistaken. Besides that, they are pretty indistinguishable. And yet chat GPT takes so much more flack. And I have never understood why we are not treating all of these LLMs with the same amount of disdain.

46:20Samir Chaudry:I think part of it is Chad GPT is a much clearer figurehead in Sam, which is way easier to attack a figurehead. Whereas like, I don't even know who the head of Anthropic is. Really? But I just heard his name yesterday and I can't remember it. I do think it's interesting to bring up. I mean, I'll never forget when Anthropic pulled out of the contract with the Defense Department. Yeah. And OpenAI stepped in and got the contract and everyone was like, we are dropping OpenAI. We're dropping ChatGPT. Everyone download Claude. And I'm like, you think Claude wouldn't have taken that deal if the deal was right?

46:57Samir Chaudry:Like, they would have been right there with them. Let's bring it back. We have two solid principles. Be honest and it should feel human. Is there anything else from you two that you think we can wrap this up that's like a really good guideline others can use? I think there's something around copying and imitation. Yes. Yes. And references, for sure. Yeah. Using something as a reference. I think, and this is something that you should abide by, in my opinion, whether you're using AI or not. You should not imitate someone so clearly. Like this needs, it's like steel like an artist. You have to take inspiration and reference, but where you take that inspiration has to go somewhere so far that that artist who originated that piece of work would be okay with what you've done with it.

47:46And that's all very subjective.

47:47Samir Chaudry:of no but i mean austin cleon said it to us um when he came on the show when we were asking there's like a large amount of plagiarism in the youtube community right people just copy and paste stuff like people's thumbnails instagram and video ideas it's like just constant right like um that is just the culture of the internet but it has become ai has created an accelerant to that and i think that is a rule like a creator rule that should exist in every context text it's like an artistic rule like don't copy my stuff for real yeah no but you're right you're right yeah like like i take inspiration hundred percent we take inspiration we look at references and we try and see where we can get and then we make something that we are honestly excited about yeah and when someone copies it when you know they don't have honest excitement they do it because they think it'll work.

48:42Samir Chaudry:Yeah. It hinders my original excitement. But I guess that is also the base premise. Like this principle three, if it's like - Steal like an artist. Steal like an artist. Like don't copy people directly. That I guess is the base principle of the anger towards AI is that it is an amalgamation of everyone's work that you actually, even if you don't know it, you are pulling from. Right? Is that one of like the biggest pieces? It's data sets that scrape the internet, that take your work, take his work, my work, everyone's images, likeness, and creative thoughts, and they repurpose and repackage. And so no original thought is really produced.

49:22And I think people are upset about that. They're also upset about the environmental aspect. I would say that's probably more important, but for the purposes of our conversation, that feels like the line.

49:32Samir Chaudry:Yeah. And if original thought, quote, because I don't believe original thought exists outside of references. But if, if, if like I come up with something really creative based on reading three books, that feels very different. Yeah. Yeah. It does. Cause it's you, you made it. But, but like the source material that is being given to me. I think, um, do you guys have any closing thoughts on just this situation in general, or even this discussion about like where, where do we want to leave people off and invite the conversation to continue? you my advice here for young creators older creators is just to make sure you protect your honest excitement for the work and for what you deliver i think that's what matters and in my opinion hank has spent years and years and years of his life developing the internal compass of what matters to him and his audience and so the methods by which he delivers that information to his audience, in my opinion, does not hinder the relationship with his audience because he has an internal barometer.

50:37Samir Chaudry:I think if he, from what he has said and his experience, feels like he needs to reevaluate his whole process, his output, everything, that to me I think is good because I don't think you should ever trade your excitement or your creative voice in exchange for efficiency. And I think that is actually just a broad danger amongst the creator community. Efficiency is very attractive in business. It becomes the outcome you're playing for as you're building a business. But what we all love about artists is the inefficiency. What we love about creators is the irrational nature of expressing an idea. It's why music and live music is so exciting is because it's just like this expression of something.

51:25Samir Chaudry:And I think coming back to as much as creativity and technology have mixed because of this thing called the creator economy, creativity will always be most interesting when you are honestly interested in doing it versus productizing it. That, I think, to me is like the biggest takeaway is like don't trade your excitement to create for efficiency. yeah and if you have some other thoughts leave them in the comments i think one thing we've learned from researching all of this is there's been uh such a lack of nuanced discussion i think it'd be great for people to be able to contribute to this yeah contribute to these principles like what do you think in terms of how creators should or shouldn't be using ai colin and i talk about this a lot we work with ai companies we are early adopters of tech we're fans of technology but we wanted to bring the broader world of voices into the room because there's different perspectives and there's more nuance to this.

52:26Samir Chaudry:And then to even broaden this out to bring all of you into the room and give us your perspective. The last thing I'll say is just give everyone some grace. It's all new. It's all new. We're figuring it all out together. But take this as an opportunity to open the discussion and hear everyone's perspective. Thanks for listening to this episode of The Colin Smear show. Leave your comments. Fun one. Thanks for joining guys. Appreciate it. Yeah. Peace.