The Artificial Human25 Sep 2024

Will Shrimp Jesus kill social media?

Sometimes, we get odd questions at the Artificial Human - ‘Why has my gran’s facebook feed been taken over by Shrimp Jesus?’ definitely raised eyebrows.

Kevin and Aleks embark on a journey into the weird and wonderful world of ‘AI Slop’ - mass produced, low quality AI images that have spread like wildfire over Social Media platforms - with Shrimp Jesus being one of the most prominent, and bizarre, examples.

They’ll speak with Renee Di Resta, about her study that reveals how algorithmic systems, designed to maximize engagement, have allowed AI slop to take over social media feeds - not because it's valuable, but because it's engineered to be highly clickable and shareable, gaming the algorithms for more impressions, likes, and comments.

And it turns out, those impressions can lead to money - BIG money... for a very select few. Aleks and Kevin talk with investigative journalist Jason Koebler about the hidden cottage industry producing the Slop - a community primarily from the Global South, trying to make money from social media reward programmes. With the help of various apps, online tutorials and hacker-like methods of avoiding spam filters, people are flocking to social media hoping to strike gold with viral images, like Shrimp Jesus.

But, will this AI Slop gold rush be the death of Social Media as we know it? And what happens to us when we just assume that anything we see online is simply not real.

And remember, if you have a question about AI that you’d like us to answer for you, get in touch with theartificialhuman@bbc.co.uk

Presenters: Aleks Krotosksi and Kevin Fong Producer: Elizabeth Ann Duffy Researcher: Emily Esson Engineer: Barry Jackson

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