Your favorite reel creators might want to clutch their ring lights a little tighter. AI is here — and it’s turning into a full-on existential threat.
At panel after panel during the 1 Billion Followers Summit in Dubai, big-name influencers, VCs, and tech honchos kept going back to the biggest question on everyone’s mind: can content creators survive a potential AI takeover?
It depends how you look at it.
The tech is here
Big Tech is reasoning that AI provides the tools that are helping to make (some) creators rich.
YouTube’s emerging markets director, Tarek Amin, said AI should amplify creativity, not replace creators. He pointed to a Google tool called Notebook LM, which can turn notes into podcast audio. It saves time, but it doesn’t replace the creator, right?
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Jeremiah Owyang, general partner at Blitzscaling Ventures, points to Spotter Studio, Delphi, Hey Gen, Astral, and Agent.ai, again, all tools that can fast-track content planning and production, leaving creators with spare hours to create MORE content. (Or just chill.)
Companies like Newo Inc. have AI receptionists answering calls during meetings or family time. These kinds of tools can help boost small business revenue by up to $40,000 a month, according to David Yang, the company’s founder, by making sure creators don’t miss out on work when they’re sleeping or eating or whatever.
But will the line between “helping” and “replacing” eventually blur beyond recognition? How about AI presenters that look human?
Seems like our favorite AI chip giant is getting ready to wave goodbye to social influencers and that already-dying breed, the TV news anchor.
Ahmed Mostafa, Nvidia’s AI adoption lead in the Middle East, showcased during the summit the Build Nvidia website, which he said could be used by creators to create videos of human presenters… using text prompts.
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Who will the money back?
And there’s more bad news for content creators. VCs (aka the folks with money) are backing the tools and not the talent, at least for now.
Harnidh Kaur of WTFund says she’s all about the infrastructure supporting creators, not the creators themselves. Meghan Lightcap of Slow Ventures adds that only niche, taboo-breaking creators are VC-worthy.
Funding for creator-focused startups is already plummeting.
Christopher Erwin, founder of RockWater Industries, a VC firm focusing on creators, says that the funding for creator economy startups declined sharply from $8 billion in 2021–22 to $2 billion in 2022–24.
That’s a staggering fall, and it’s not exactly inspiring confidence.
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So, who wins?
It’s complicated.
The outlook appears bright for both, according to AI writer Tirupati Rao on Medium. As AI continues to shape industries, the writer reckons that demand for creators who know how to leverage AI will only grow.
We think Rao means to say: adapt or get replaced.
Marina Mogilko, a content creator with nearly 10 million followers, thinks humans still have the storytelling edge because “good stories always win,” and human creators are likely to script those better than AI, for now.
In the next couple of years, though, as AI gets better and better at the creative side of things? “Some of us are going to be replaced by companies and people using AI,” she says.
But look, AI is creating the same challenge for creators that the internet once created for traditional media — disrupting the industry and forcing newspapers and TV to innovate and adapt to remain relevant.
Looks like the creator economy might have to rewrite its own script.
Edited by Amitoj Singh and Ankush Chibber. If you have any tips, ideas or feedback, please get in touch: talk-to-us@moniify.com
