Will this AI actress be the next Oscar winner?

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1:16Hello and welcome to the Times Tech Podcast, where every week we unpack how technology is reshaping business, culture and everyday life. I am Danny Fortson out here in Silicon Valley. And I'm Katie Prescott, Katie in the city, the city of London. And in this week's episode, we're looking at a new era of AI, believe it or not. I know it feels like there's a new era every week. But at NVIDIA's big powwow this week in California, boss Jensen Huang has predicted that the company could hit a trillion dollars in revenue by next year. So, as this month... A multi-billion dollar industry, almost a trillion apparently, races ahead.

2:04We're questioning whether us humans are already being left behind. That's right. And we're going to do it via one of those things everybody cares about, entertainment. So at the Oscars this week, Conan O 'Brien, very funny man, joked that he was going to be the last human host of the Academy Awards. It got a laugh, but it also hit a nerve. because AI has come around at a time when Hollywood is really struggling. It's been nearly three years since the writers went on strike over pay. And specifically the use of AI, so did actors. It was one of the longest work stoppages ever. It went on for nearly five months, virtually shut down the entire town.

2:45And the next round of negotiations have begun right now. Like they're happening. They have begun. And yet again, AI is front and center of those conversations. And the unions are expected to put forward a new so-called Tilly tax. Amazing. You must be wondering, what on earth is a Tilly tax? But that is kind of the shorthand for a fee that studios would have to pay them for using an AI actor. And why is it called a Tilly tax, Danny? I'm so glad you asked. This is all in response to the creation of Tilly Norwood. And you may remember she made news, if we can call her a she, last year as the world's first quote-unquote AI actor.

3:34And all of this got us thinking, could an AI actor, a bunch of ones and zeros, anthropomorphized into what looks like a real human, be in the running for next year's Academy Awards? It's funny that you said, could she be a she? I mean, it feels an awful long time ago that we were having a debate over what pronouns to use for people, doesn't it? I mean, throw an AI to that debate. What do you call an AI? What do you call an AI? Yeah, I don't know. An it? I'm not even sure I want to go there. But we might be able to ask our guest this week who, I mean, is probably the perfect person to answer this question, but is also Hollywood's public enemy number one.

4:17Is that fair to say? if not the creative industries as a whole. So we are shortly going to be speaking to Aline van der Velden, and she is the creator of Tilly Norwood and the CEO of an AI production company. She thinks, and we will talk to her all about this, that AI actors could be a more ethical alternative to real performance. And this is exactly what Hollywood has been worried about, isn't it? That's right. And so, you know, I was recently in LA talking to, for a completely separate event, but I ended up at this event with sitting next to two screenwriters and they were completely freaked out because they're like, look, one thing is certain.

5:00We cannot afford another strike, but things seem to be getting worse for the kind of the humans in that town, right because the streaming wars are over you've had this huge merger skydance and warner brothers funded by 80 billion dollars of debt everybody's expecting huge new rounds of layoffs and then here you have ai and things like creations like tilly norwood where it's like she's singing she's dancing she's talking she's looking like a real actress exactly and so it raises some huge huge questions And I do think it'll be interesting to see how this all develops. But it just speaks to me. It speaks to this moment we're in where people are like, AI is this shiny new toy still.

5:50Therefore, let's like try all the crazy stuff. Let's just create an actor from whole cloth and see what people think. And it's obviously creating like very strong reactions on all sides. And it's not just in Hollywood. I mean, I remember the strike so well over on your side of the pond. And they just had a massive impact here too, right? Because there's so many studios here and actually so much production space here that gets used by Hollywood. And that just all totally shut down and it sent ripples through the industry. And it's fascinating that we're having this discussion about Tilly Norwood with Tilly Norwood's creator this week, because also here in the UK, there's been this long awaited announcement from the government about what it plans to do over copyright to deal with this route between the creative industries, hugely important in Britain, worth£146 billion to the economy, supporting 7 % of UK jobs.

6:48and also the tech industry and AI, which has been using the creative industry's content without permission. So anyway, big announcement expectations. And the government, as you always say, they do in Britain announce some consultations. What color paper is it? That's a really good question. Is it white? It was a written ministerial statement. Oh, okay. And anyway, so Liz Kendall, friend of the pod, Minister for Tech said, we reject any suggestion we must choose between our creative industries and the UK's AI sector. But yes, no decisions were made. Clearly, the creative industry is being flooded with AI content.

7:34And while some creators are pushing back, others are embracing it. So our big question today is, is AI empowering people or replacing them. But if we just step back at this kind of crazy moment, we all find ourselves, we've got Tilly Norwood. We've got these labor talks with one of the biggest, most kind of visible industries on the planet that are kicking off as we speak, highly contentious. You have all these technological forces that are taking people out of theaters, streaming, et cetera. And so everybody's throwing all these things at the wall to try to see what may, you know, what sticks, including this is where it gets really dark for you and I and podcasting.

8:19But not just for you and I, for our entire team that sit behind the podcast. And there was a moment this week, we have a WhatsApp group for the podcast where one of the team sent a message saying this is blowing up the podcast desk. The reason that everyone was freaking out is because the first fully AI generated podcast reached the top of the Apple podcast charts. And it's called the Epstein files and described as the first AI native documentary pod. But no studio or production team made it, right? It came out of the brain of one entrepreneur, a data entrepreneur called Adam Levy, who vibe coded the podcast.

9:02So as everybody knows, all these files have been published online. the epstein files which are full of images and emails and all that sort of stuff and after 48 hours albeit working 14 to 16 hour days fair play he built the system that ingests all those documents cross-references sources he says and basically built these scripted podcast episodes narrated by fake people ai people so anyway let's hear a clip because because it is it is quite extraordinary not least that it's hit the top of the chart and yeah just to say again these voices are AI voices. Our mission here is to act as a filter. We're using AI-assisted tools to process the sheer volume, but it's human analysis, forensic accounting that's making sense of it.

9:49And that's a key distinction. We are not here to speculate. Absolutely not. We are reviewers of the record. If we have a document, we'll tell you, we'll cite it. But where there are gaps in that record, and believe me, there are significant gaps. We're going to point them out. We will acknowledge the silence. We're not going to fill it in with theories. We're simply going to measure the void.

10:11Measure the void for me. What do you think? So I did listen to one of the episodes. So let me say, Adam Levy, not a journalist or a lawyer. And what he is doing, I think, is really interesting because AI can do things that you or I or maybe even a team of humans can do. which is trawl through millions of documents in a way that's just like harder for us to do right at speed at speed without stopping for breaks or sleep yeah all of those things and maybe it's because we talk often on this podcast about jobs the future of work what does it mean to be human all of this stuff the voice is in there you know it's like the video when you sit down in your chair in the plane and they're like all right this is what you do this is the emergency because it's like this voice, professional narrator, Muzak kind of vibe.

11:10There's like a lack of warmth to it. A lack of warmth to it. And I would also say a lack of sense. One of the things you're always taught in radio is to speak like a human or to speak like you would to your friends, which I think is sometimes why people enjoy the podcasting medium. And who knows, like if it hit number one in the charts, were all those human listers? We don't know, right? Were they human listers, but also were they sort of ticking that box that everybody's obsessed with the Epstein files and this podcast was presenting itself as the definitive guide to it? Yeah. And it's pumping out episodes, right?

11:48And that's the other thing. But I... Well, it can. Exactly. So it is doing something in that sense, new and different. And I am just a little conscious of just trying to kind of comfort ourselves, you know, of like, are we just picking nits just because the alternative is way too scary? Well, we should say because the podcast team have been obviously interested in this story, there is an episode about it on the story, which is the Times' daily podcast. And one of our colleagues at the Times actually got in touch with Adam Levy just to ask him to, you know, how on earth they put it together. So we thought we'd play a little clip of what Adam had to say.

12:29I'm not a journalist by trade. I'm a content creator. And I have a set of values that I run my life with. I like to be honest. I like the facts. I don't like BS. I like when things are said for what they are. And I try to create content and build product around some of those values. So I can't speak to journalism as a whole because that's not my trade. I just know what I would like to get from the media and the information that I consume. And if nobody else is going to do it, I will. Yeah, so you can hear more of that interview with him on the story from The Times where our colleagues delve more into that.

13:15Yeah, so I think what's interesting about this, and again, it feels to me like an experiment. And maybe this experiment will become like a thing. the way that, you know, podcasts became a thing before they weren't a thing. It's such an exciting time. And to that point about AI generation, there's also the sort of flip side of that is a lot of people are considering now how on earth you show whether something is AI generated and how important that is. So do we care and how much should we care if AI has been used in the creation of something? like that podcast is a fun experiment but you know if it if it's just used in research for example do we need to say so yeah and it's it's conversation people are having around the world their calls to develop basically think of it like a certified organic or fair trade some kind of human made label right that so when people are consuming whatever a podcast a film a music video a book that they know it is, has actually been created by a, you know, it's quote unquote, proudly human or AI free.

14:30It's like pesticide free. It's an interesting kind of movement. It's a thing that people are talking about, especially in the arts industry. Can I tell you something that will fill your heart with gladness? It was actually in the british government's proposals or or paper today of whatever color that paper was on what should be done about ai and copyright in the creative industries yeah yeah so there will be a task force oh not a task force there will be a task force will they be armed you're in the wrong country we don't arm our task force SEAL Team 6 coming in for the AI. Yeah, exactly. No drones, just pens.

15:12They're going to put forward proposals on best practice for labeling AI-generated content. And I just laugh because you always take the mick about this, but there will be an interim report on this published in the autumn. The task force is going to create an interim report. One must be respectful of humans, one said. The royal we. believe. Anyway, but the basic point is exactly the one you made, which is, it is helpful or apparently everyone who responded to the consultation, because there was a consultation to the government said, actually, they want to know whether content has been made using AI.

15:53So there you go. You know, you're starting to see little bits and pieces of this, right? Like, and I think it was a 2024 film, Heretic, starring Hugh Grant. There's a disclaimer, no generative AI was used in the making of this film. And you have like companies like there's a UK company books by people charges publishers and requires them to carry out questionnaires about their practices and how they vet their authors. So there is this kind of pushback. But again, I feel like we're right in the middle of this just really funky time where it's like AI has dropped from the sky on all of our heads and everybody's trying to figure out what to do with it it's interesting on on the label point as well isn't it because you can see in some areas for example news it's absolutely vital that you know if something is is real or not when it gets to writing or filmmaking it's so nuanced because what does it mean being used does it mean for research purposes does it mean fact checking does it mean rewriting a sentence to try and make it more fluid or using it for synonyms.

17:03Anyway. You wrote a book last year. AI was super helpful. It was incredibly helpful. Yeah. Right. Absolutely. And so like. It's a huge volume of information very quickly. So is your book certified human made or like what? I would definitely put a certified human made label on it, but it's a good point because yes, AI was used in the making of the book in some sense. So are the creative industries right to be scared? And can AI do their jobs better than they can? Well, our next guest might have some answers. We'll be right back shortly speaking to the creator of Tilly Norwood.

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19:45Hello and welcome back to the Times Tech Podcast. So today we are asking, is AI empowering people or replacing them? At the center of the debate is Tilly Norwood, an actor that's causing a stir in Hollywood and around the world. That's because she has something other actors don't. She'll never get old. She never forgets her lines. She never needs a bathroom break. Don't think she's part of a union. She doesn't complain. That's quite crucial. I wonder how much she judges. She doesn't complain about the size of her trailer. She doesn't need a trailer at all because, of course, she's not real. She's not real.

20:28So, yeah, unlike me, she doesn't ask for champagne and Maltesers in my trailer. Tilly Norwood is an AI actor created by Eileen van der Velden, a former actress and comedian herself, and now the founder and CEO of the AI production company Particle 6. and we are delighted to have her on the podcast today. Welcome, Aline. Thank you very much for joining us. Lovely to be here. For listeners who don't know, who is Tilly Norwood and how did you come up with the idea for her? And is it right to call her her? I think so. Just like you would a character in a book, right? Like, I mean, she's fictional.

21:07I mean, we converted the production company that I'd started 10 years ago, three years ago, into an AI production company. And I was following all the AI news very closely And I saw all the AI influencers start emerging. And I thought, well, I'd like to make something with this new tech. And so what do I know? I know acting because I was an actor and I also studied physics. So I sort of wasn't afraid of the tech and the computing part. And so I was like, OK, I'll make an AI actor because that's what I know. And I then, you know, worked back and forth with the AI to ensure that she was exactly how I wanted her to be.

21:40and the name and the look and everything was such a long integral process. And then I launched her and that was Tilly Norwood. And what was the response to kind of the good, bad and ugly when you came out? Because I remember there was like a moment, right, where people were freaking out. And we we before you got on, we were talking about the broader context of Hollywood, the writer's strike, the actor's strike, these new negotiations starting. And AI is like right at the heart of it. So debate over copyright. Yeah, exactly. So when you brought this out initially, what was the reaction? And were you surprised?

22:19I initially released her in the UK in a video called AI Commissioner, which was like a comedy sketch. And I've always been making stuff like this. Like I made loads of viral videos for the BBC that got 15 million views. I've made comedy characters like I've always been in the business of of tapping into the zeitgeist and creating something that resonates with people. so this is just another way of doing that and I think when when I released her in July in the UK it wasn't that big a deal where everyone in the UK sort of working with AI and everyone's like cool yeah we're we're dabbling in it too you know we need to do what we can with the budgets we get given and then I released her in September end of September at Zurich Film Festival to a Hollywood audience to sort of showcase what was possible with AI right it was a industry audience It was me.

23:08And I've been doing that for the whole of 2025. I've been showing people like, guys, this is what's possible with AI. Like, I just want everyone to know so we can start thinking about this. And then it massively blew up because I think people hadn't been dabbling in the way that they had in the UK. It's a bigger industry. And she really represented the zeitgeist and the fear that people were feeling around this AI taking over and taking my job thing. That's what she represented. And so I can totally understand the response that people had to her. And they thought, oh, my goodness, this is all going to come in and take my job.

23:46And when when that's not obviously what what she was there to do. We always said she wouldn't and she's not allowed to. And that wasn't the purpose. The purpose was to shake people up. And I think she achieved that. And I think she made a lot of people think, how am I going to future proof my career and what I do in this industry? And I guess it's more than a representation of that, right? She became a target almost for that fear. We love a scapegoat as a human species. And so I think she became that human symbol for AI. And so she became the scapegoat and she became the symbol to attack for everything that people hate about AI.

24:26And I want to delve into some of the controversy there, but just explain to listeners, how does she work? Like, is it a chatbot behind her? So, yes, we are creating sort of her brain at the moment, which is a long, arduous process, actually, of creating how we think she should be thinking and how she should respond. So that's a separate thing. But when we first created her, it's just like it's like an onion, really. Like when you're acting a character out, you start from the outside in. So first it was her look. And I went back and forth so many times with AI about what she should look like. And I very much felt that AI was wrong about a lot of the suggestions because she looked really like airbrushed and perfect.

25:12And I was like, no, I want more just real grittiness and girl next door vibe. And so it was a long process to get to the right look for me. And then the name, I didn't want anyone in the world to have her name so I could trademark it. And I know Ryan Reynolds tried to find Attila Norwood and he couldn't. He found a Natalie Norwood. So fortunately, my research was right. But yeah, so a lot of work went into that. And then in terms of how she actually sort of works when she's acting, you prompt her? I mean, what is that? Yeah, it's not as mysterious as people think it might be. So it's basically an image, you input an image and you input a prompt.

25:51And that was how we were making her act last year. And so she's trained probably on everybody's data. This is how I have peace with it. It's trained on, not on actors necessarily. When she's acting, she's trained on how humans behave. So probably home videos, everything that's been uploaded to YouTube. I sometimes, you know, when it first started happening, I was like, oh my goodness, this is probably trained on me and you and everybody. But the way I have peace with it is that us as a human species, we've always been building on everything that's come before us as a human species. And so that's why we go to university and we read all the articles and all the research that somebody in that field has done.

26:30And so at least all these tools are open to everybody to use. So we can all build on top of the whole of humanity that's come before us. And that's the only way I have peace with the fact these tools are trained on all of our work. And you're using one particular tool? All the tools. We use everything. The point of her is experimenting, right? And finding out where the tech is at and which tools can do what. You know, it's very much prompting with an image and then hoping she stays consistent, which was still a problem last year. and then now at this moment in time we can do performance capture which we did for the music video so i as an actor can act out what tilly should be acting as and then it gets mapped so it's video to video so you input an image of tilly in the setting we input a video and then it maps her image onto my video like like an animation or video games like how they do that exactly like avatar and that's a new tech that's come out you mentioned the debut single in music video it's called take the lead shall we uh give it a listen for those who haven't heard it Actors, it's time to take the lead Create the future, plant the seed Don't be left out, don't fall behind Build your own and you'll be free We can scale, we can grow Be the creators we've always known It's the next evolution, can't you see?

28:08AI's not the enemy It's the key I did like some of the rhymes, enemy and key. Well, so there's two things about that. The one is the video starts with the message that, you know, it says it took 18 real humans to create this video, which is interesting. And then the song is about like basically embracing AI as this is the future. And I'm just wondering, again, when you step back and you have this visceral reaction from people and like just the reality of economics of a Hollywood where it's struggling and people are freaked out. like how do you see this going or where do you think this should go in terms of the use of AI, AI actors or kind of how the entertainment industry is changing with these very, very, very real economic forces kind of coming in from all sides?

29:09It's very real. So the lyrics are based off on an essay that I wrote for Variety, which is basically about, you know, I converted my business to become an AI production company because I wanted to future-proof myself and me as an actor as well. And we are very aware of all the changes that are happening. Now, I would say, you know, the situation that the industry is in right now isn't the result of AI, right? That is because of other factors that have happened over the last five years. So I think people like to blame AI for what's currently happening, but we have to separate the two things first and foremost.

29:44secondly in my essay i mean the video is ridiculous right it's purposely ridiculous because we're trying to go what can we do that's beyond the normal realm yeah at one point she's writing like a inflatable flamingo through the clouds yeah like it's it's just like Let's be ridiculous. It's my young daughter's dreams. Is this kind of where you got this from? Because with AI, you can go beyond what's normally possible within your budget and normally possible within camera or production, right? So it's also about expanding your creativity and your mind to think, like, what's the most ludicrous? Like, what can we do that was never possible before?

30:30so the video is sort of all about demonstrating what was never possible before we can do now but then it's also about yes there is a serious economic situation here and these things always end up different to what we think and what we have realized so three years ago i was very much like oh my goodness all jobs are gone that's it hollywood is gone and as i've moved further into the AI workflow and how to produce a film with AI, I'm realizing that that's absolutely not true. And this is sort of what I'm imploring people to do is like, think beyond. And people are worried that if they touch AI, they will lose their job.

31:09It's the complete opposite. If you know how to use AI in your industry, you will be king, right? Or queen, whatever it is. So if you're an actor, and you know how to become an AI actor, you will have lots of work. Like I, as an AI actor, I have lots of work now, which I wasn't expecting. Sailing through a cloud on an inflatable flamingo. For example, if you're a production coordinator and you know how to use AI, if you're a costume designer and you know how to use AI, if you're a production designer, all these jobs are coming up. And we've realized as we're making bigger and bigger productions, because we're in production with AI productions, with major studios, with big Hollywood directors, with actors, you name it.

31:52we're not talking about because everybody's so worried about their name being out there associated to AI. But everybody is moving in that direction. And we feel very passionate about upskilling and retooling people to get prepared, to prepare a workforce for this new realm. And I feel personally very, very passionate about that. That's like the only way that we can gain some agency and be in creative control of what's going to happen. So give us a glimpse behind the curtain then I appreciate you don't want to name names we know you for Tilly Norwood but what sort of work is your production company doing yeah Tilly's just the poster girl but we have a whole studio behind that so we have an advertising so brand and campaign department they're churning out adverts all the time so it's much more accepted within adverts we're doing lots of motion capture with actors in that where we have costume designers we have production designers we have directors we have producers, we have DOPs.

32:50Every single one of those roles is working with AI. Also production managers, budgets, risk assessments, call sheets, everything is optimized in the workflow to work with AI. And what about the economics of this? I mean, you mentioned economics earlier, but is it actually cheaper? As Danny said, there were 18 people involved in making the music video. It's still quite hard, right? So we say it's about 50 % reduction in cost and time. Five zero. Five zero. So half, which is huge, right? I mean, yeah. That's an industry upender. Yeah, it will completely change the industry. Absolutely. But it will go very gradually.

33:31So on the bigger productions we're doing, it's very much hybrid. It's just a few scenes here and there. You know, there's little bits that people are using it with. But I think by the end of this year, there'll be no production that is zero percent AI, or at least very few because it'll be in the production management it will be in every it'll be like electricity or wi-fi it will be ingrained in some way shape or form i mean most post-production there's some level of ai involved already you know we mentioned earlier the union negotiations that are just starting up between the studios and the actors and the writers and one of these ideas floating around is something they're calling a tilly tax which i'm sure you've heard about And this would be a fee the studios would basically pay for using AI actors.

34:17It sounds like in a way, almost like artistic universal basic income where, you know, like that, if, if you're using this technology for do, to do something that a human would do, you need to kind of give back, so to speak, some of that 50 % give back. So people aren't just kind of out of jobs and with nothing to do. What do you think about that? I think it's very different for a studio compared to, say, for an actor who's decided that they want to act through their digital twin. Right. So if you're employing the digital twin of Matthew McConaughey, for example, in a film, you would just pay him his fee and get his consent to do that.

34:59Right. I think that would be the same process as it is now. And the same thing goes for me. If you're using Tilly, right, you're employing me, basically. I'm the actor behind Tilly. So I think that will be very different if a studio creates, say, 20 actors and controls them all themselves. That's very different to a human creator creating a Tilly. But to your point around the 50%, which is a big, big number, those people who are the actor behind the AI actor, I presume they're getting paid a whole hell of a lot less than they otherwise would. And also kind of stepping back more philosophically, actors don't get into acting, at least the ones I know, to not be seen.

35:44Something in the people who choose that profession, isn't it? Yeah. I mean, yes. And they can just play their digital twin. That's totally fine. I have no problem with that. But there's a lot of great theater actors in the UK, for example, who much prefer a sort of calmer rehearsal environment, you know, where everything gets performance captured. And it's really about the craft and about the emotion and about the connection between the director and the actors. And it's a it's a really comfortable setting as opposed to being on set with all the tech around you. And it's about hair and makeup and what you look like.

36:17So absolutely. And you'll still have those actors that want to be seen. And that's also fine. What do you think about the idea of putting a sort of label on creative content, which has been made by AI and the importance of that? we've always been very transparent about tilly being ai i think that there's no problem with that i think people should be transparent i think it will be hard in the future because everything will have some element of ai in it and sure just like people still want to shoot on film that's you know you'll still get people who want to make a full non-ai program as well that's also fine you've described kind of ai actors as a more ethical alternative to real performance and i just trying to understand what that means?

37:04Yeah. So there's a few ways in which I view it as more ethical. For example, me personally, I feel it's much safer to act through an AI actor, right? So I don't personally have to be that outward image. I don't have to deal with fame or be recognized. I don't have to worry about my looks or get Botox or my hair or my weight. There's a lot of mental health stuff that I think makes it more ethical to act through an extension of myself like Tilly. Secondly is when it comes to children or dogs or any animals using AI instead of the real equivalent might be seen as more ethical. And then there's also the carbon footprint like people you know they get so hung up and they think oh this is wasting all the water in the world and the carbon footprint of this is enormous.

37:53Actually if you do the like for like with a So, you know, if you wanted to shoot the equivalent in a traditional sense, the carbon footprint would be 90 % higher. So, you know, you're going straight into post-production. So it's quite a low carbon footprint production. Before you go, does Tilly have an agent? Oh, good question. So we thought, oh, we should get her signed at some point. And we were talking to all the agents about it. But she's so famous now. We don't really need to. There's so much incoming. You don't need to give someone else commission. maybe there'll be an ai agent at some point an agent that specializes in ai characters my mind is blown well that's our job danny there you go indeed that's our side hustle aline thank you so much for for taking the time it's been great to talk to you thank you guys yeah thank you aka tilly norwood

38:46so what you think i was really impressed by her actually i thought she was very funny and very self-aware. And it's certainly not the, oh my goodness, you know, I'm making AI because I want to take over the industry. Is it? And it's far more nuanced than that. And I thought it was fascinating to hear her point about the industry already using it, not wanting to speak about it. And she didn't want to say the names of the companies that they're working with, but actually it's incredibly clever what she's done, creating someone, something, I don't know what do you say like tilly norwood as an it but she did say her but as the front of her business that has garnered huge huge attention but actually it's just the front door to a much much bigger thing yeah very clever marketing yeah and and raising and raising a point and raising awareness of how ai is changing the industry but not in the way that everybody is freaking out about.

39:46I mean, that wasn't what she was saying. The thing that struck me was like, to your point around everybody's already using AI, which gives back to that question around like 100 % human made or whatever, I think is kind of a, I understand, but it feels like a kind of a desperate grabbing at straws when this is, you know, the train has already left the station in terms of AI being used. 50 % figure. Well, this is the thing I was going to say is that two things one going back to my conversation with these writers in hollywood they're like you know under our current contract we have to like sign these declarations that we're not using ai in our process and he's like of course everybody is how on earth do you police that you don't but it's part of this like you know the industry is struggling the union is struggling which I totally understand.

40:36The union is about protecting their people, protecting labor. And to your point around the 50%, that's for an industry that, you know, again, if you think about Paramount Warner Brothers,$110 billion deal funded by$80 billion of debt, smashing together these giant studios, they're going to be under huge, huge, huge, huge pressure to cut costs. and then you're like just look at the numbers 50 like that is too big to ignore you know for the industry and what that means for like the shape of the industry in hollywood in particular like the actual physical place of la is going to be really interesting to see how that plays out but you can see what direction this is going i thought her safety argument there was compelling you know you're not having people out and about and doing stumps yeah by that no not really um but again i guess that could that tension between like the humans doing a job versus like oh we can replace it by a machine and i don't think it's going to go as far as people are fearing like to her point which i thought was good it's like oh no like all these jobs aren't just going to disappear, but they are going to change.

41:58As we've seen in music, as we've seen in journalism, the cost structure is just going to change pretty fundamentally. And that's going to be a really messy process. She's not sending Tilly Norwood dancing out to challenge Brad Pitt. No, that's not exactly. And she was very clear about the links as well, which I thought was fascinating between the AI and the actors behind them. But that 50 % figure sums it all up. Maybe, you know, it's the cost, but it's also maybe half the industry. That's what it becomes. It's the cost. And it's also, like I said, which we talked about, which is like, how many actors you know don't want to be on stage or on screen?

42:41None. It kind of gets to the very notion of what art is and who artists are. so i think that's what's really interesting the limelight exactly it was great to have her on the podcast and she certainly wasn't the you know the the figure of hate that maybe i was expecting no no no she's very thoughtful and very savvy but i do think it's kind of it's a glimpse at kind of these very very big forces that are crashing in on this industry right now. Yeah. Getting to the meat. Well, quite what a time to be having this conversation. Yeah. So, so kind of coming back to where we started is a empowering people or replacing people.

43:23I think it's both, right? It's, it's kind of everything everywhere all at once. So it is both kind of amazing. As I said, you can kind of, you're empowered to make stuff in a way that's just completely impossible before, but there's also, it's like a little bit like AI writing there's a certain kind of muzak vibe to it where you're just like the world is going to become elevator music where you're just kind of like middle of the road yeah middle of the road road kind of boring doesn't offend anybody and that's kind of not art the answer to our big question is is yes which is you know yes and yes but yeah totally fascinating and that is it for this week's episode of the Times Tech Podcast.

44:09If you are enjoying the show, drop us a line to let us know, please. Yeah, we'd also love to know your thoughts on today's discussion. I mean, how would you feel about listening to an AI generated podcast or watching an AI film? Should there be some kind of tilly tax on AI actors? What do you think we want to know? Yes, you can tell us by emailing us at techpod at thetimes.co.uk. That is techpod at thetimes.co.uk. And that is it. We will see you back here next week for another fabulous episode. Till then, bye-bye. Goodbye.

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