Sakshi VenkatramanUS reporter
Kaaviya Sambasivam/Simone Mckenzie/Google Veo 3
Kaaviya Sambasivam, left, is a popular influencer. Gigi, right, is an AI influencer
In some ways, Gigi is like any other young social media influencer.
With perfect hair and makeup, she logs on and talks to her fans. She shares clips: eating, doing skin care, putting on lipstick. She even has a cute baby who appears in some videos.
But after a few seconds, something may seem a little off.
She can munch on pizza made out of molten lava, or apply snowflakes and cotton candy as lip gloss. Her hands sometimes pass through what she’s holding.
That’s because Gigi isn’t real. She’s the AI creation of University of Illinois student Simone Mckenzie – who needed to make some money over the summer.
Ms Mckenzie, 21, is part of a fast-growing cohort of digital creators who churn out a stream of videos by entering simple prompts into AI chatbots, like Google Veo 3. Experts say this genre, dubbed “AI slop” by some critics and begrudging viewers, is taking over social media feeds.
And its creators are finding considerable success.
“One video made me $1,600 [£1,185] in just four days,” Ms Mckenzie said. “I was like, okay, let me keep doing this.”
After two months, Gigi had millions of views, making Ms Mckenzie thousands through TikTok’s creator fund, a programme that pays creators based on how many views they get. But she’s far from the only person using AI to reach easy virality, experts said.
“It’s surging right now and it’s probably going to continue,” said Jessa Lingel, associate professor and digital culture expert at the University of Pennsylvania.
Its progenitors – who now can generate videos of literally anything in just a few minutes – have the potential to disrupt the lucrative influencer economy.
But while some say AI is ruining social media, others see its potential to democratise who gains fame online, Lingel said. Those who don’t have the money or time for a fancy background, camera setup or video editing tools can now go viral, too.
Simone Mckenzie/Google Veo 3
Part of the prompt McKenzie used to create her most viral video of Gigi
Traditional influencers being pushed out?
Social media influencing only recently became a legitimate career path. But in just a few years, the industry has grown to be worth over $250bn, according to investment firm Goldman Sachs. Online creators often use their own lives – their vacations, their pets, their makeup routines – to make content and attract a following.
AI creators who can make the same thing – only faster, cheaper and without the constraints of reality.
“It certainly has the potential to upset the creator space,” said Brooke Duffy, a digital and social media scholar at Cornell University.