Story idea:
Title: After These Messages.
In the distant future, a couple watches an old cigarette commercial, wondering if there are any commercials being made today that will be as laughable in the future. They’re revealed to be robots that have taken over humankind.
The sudden and terrifying advent of “AI” in our current world has spawned strikes, debates, and has been mirrored in countless forms of media. The concept itself is scary enough, but to me, watching TV advertisements for AI products is what truly terrifies me. I couldn’t quite put my finger on it until I saw an AI ad starring Keanu Reeves. The irony of Neo himself promoting AI software feels not only obvious in the commercial but almost embraced.
It was one thing in the 30s and 50s for advertisements to blatantly lie about the “health benefits” of smoking cigarettes. Many companies knew of its dangers, but the world on a whole was still blissfully ignorant.
Science- fiction has spent the last century and more exploring the dangers of AI. From Metropolis to M3GAN. From Asimov’s Foundation trilogy to The Matrix trilogy. From James Cameron to Philip K. Dick. Yet, we are still acting just as blissfully ignorant.
The tone-deafness of all the new AI commercials makes me laugh. And it also terrifies me. And it’s what spawned this story idea.
What painful ironies have spawned a story for you?
Start your story in the comments below…