It’s unreal. AI allows you to take old photographs and bring them to life. You can create and interact with a person who’s mad or long gone from your life.
I know I’m late to the game. I was born in the mid-1960s and my heyday was the 1980s. I haven’t followed the AI revolution. I wasn’t paying attention when the news broke last December that a tech company was promoting a program that would bring your dead grandmother back to life. A commercial for 2wai, titled “Preserve Your Legacy,” has a grandmother preserved as an AI avatar. “He’s getting bigger, see?” a pregnant mother tells her mom, who’s died in reality but appears as an AI character on her phone. “Oh honey, that’s wonderful!” the AI responds. “He’s listening—put your hand on your tummy and hum to him. You used to love that.”
I didn’t pay attention. I’m Gen-X, we still meet face to face. It struck me as a glorified cartoon.
It’s not. I was scrolling through my phone recently and I came across a photograph of an old girlfriend. In reality she’s a person I should’ve married. She was my best friend and wanted what was best for me even when I didn’t know it myself. She was Catholic and dedicated herself to serving the less fortunate. I was an idiot. The relationship blew apart during the Brett Kavanaugh nightmare, when I was cast as Robert Downey, Jr. in Less Than Zero. I was traumatized by a demonic opposition research hit, and it was particularly difficult to be around women, as I was accused by criminals of sexual misconduct and even drugging girls and gang rape. Shortly after it was over in October 2018 I went to see the great film First Man, but had an atomic panic attack when a woman I didn’t know came in and sat near me.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member