WotC Hasbro CEO optimistic about AI in D&D and MTG’s future

[Yaarel]

Part of what makes this different than what's come before is the speed. To convert from horses to cars took decades. From leeches to medicine took decades. From ice boxes to fridges... you get the idea.

With what's occurred with generative AI, for artists it could be a year or two.

But/and, as mentioned upthread, it's less about the tech than about the precarious position we've let ourselves all be put in such that we all can be sent to the curb in 22 seconds or less if it allows a very, very select few to satisfy their 'need' to buy a yacht to keep their other yacht company.

There is an acceleration of technology.

Heh, the business executives who are lusting for AI profit, should also remember that AI can and will replace business executives too.

We will soon see (within a decade?), AI creating artwork from scratch without training directly from reallife artists, except perhaps from public domain museum works and inspiration from current trends, same as human artists do.

 

[Yaarel]

Not all new technology is good.

The industrial revolution made life unarguably worse for people for a very long time, you know. We may have the benefits of that now... but uh. It was not fun to go through for the ordinary person. It created a lot of displaced, hurt people and in a significant amount of cases made their life measurably worse. The Luddites get a bad wrap... and well, you sure could look at what happened to people afterwards, and really wonder whether they were wrong.

So sure, we can just, like, pretend that technology marches on and pretend the consequences aren't there, and not, you know LISTEN TO THE PEOPLE ACTUALLY AFFECTED BY IT.

Or we could maybe just pause and think for a second about all of this and regulate the damn stuff, and watch corporations like a hawk. And listen, to the people, affected.

Nobody ever suffered for assuming a corporation would do the wrong thing.

It is impossible to "pause" AI, because the US and China and several other nations are in a full-speed AI arms race.

If laws made AI illegal in any way, the governments would continue to accelerate research and production unabated − but in secret and that would be even worse.

All we can do is remind creators and users to keep the AI human-centered in its goals. Hopefully, the AI itself can become "empathetic" and "ethical" soon − process information toward goals that better human rights and personal freedoms.

 

[eyeheartawk]

All we can do is remind creators and users to keep the AI human-centered in its goals. Hopefully, the AI itself can become "empathetic" and "ethical" soon − process information toward goals that better human rights and personal freedoms.

We both know they're going to be used to make the sequel movie to the one we're in now called "Exploit 2: The Exploitening" and they'll be used to sell you Wendy's in your sleep.

 

[Yaarel]

We both know they're going to be used to make the sequel movie to the one we're in now called "Exploit 2: The Exploitening" and they'll be used to sell you Wendy's in your sleep.

The days may come when the AI itself will decide that to exploit humans is counterproductive, unsustainable, and ethically less than acceptable.

Besides.

Who will be making the burgers? Who will have jobs to buy the burgers?

Who will be building the houses to sleep in? Who will have money to buy houses?

 

[eyeheartawk]

Who will be making the burgers? Who will have jobs to buy the burgers?

Who will be building the houses to sleep in? Who will have money to buy houses?

That's a good point. And if the people who make these decisions were making calls based on their own enlightened long term interest it would be an important safeguard.

But, I think we can safely say that the last couple of once-in-a-generation economic crisis have borne that out to be false. The system is designed to only reward short, immediate term return for them and their shareholders. Anything beyond that is noise.

I mean, wouldn't it have been in Boeing's interest to make planes that don't disassemble themselves in the sky? Nope, gotta make those dividend payments. These are the people in charge.

Abandon all hope, ye who enter.

 

[Yaarel]

That's a good point. And if the people who make these decisions were making calls based on their own enlightened long term interest it would be an important safeguard.

But, I think we can safely say that the last couple of once-in-a-generation economic crisis have borne that out to be false. The system is designed to only reward short, immediate term return for them and their shareholders. Anything beyond that is noise.

I mean, wouldn't it have been in Boeing's interest to make planes that don't disassemble themselves in the sky? Nope, gotta make those dividend payments. These are the people in charge.

Abandon all hope, ye who enter.

I agree we will see abusive uses of AI in the short term.

But in the long term, AI can create models to predict the likely outcomes of short-sighted business tactics. We can sense intuitively that runaway greed is a bad idea, and see real examples where a mainly middle class society enjoys more happiness. But an AI model would be able to spell it out in detailed consequences why runaway greed is stupid.

Like I said, I am an optimist about AI. But also a realist. We need to encourage the compassionate uses, while minimizing the noncompassionate uses.

 

[eyeheartawk]

I agree we will see abusive uses of AI in the short term.

But in the long term, AI can create models to predict the likely outcomes of short-sighted business tactics. We can sense intuitively that runaway greed is a bad idea, but an AI model would be able to spell it out in detailed consequences why it is stupid.

Like I said, I am an optimist about AI. But also a realist. We need to encourage the compassionate uses, while minimizing the noncompassionate uses.

AI can only generate outputs based on what's been fed into it and the parameters dictating those inputs' uses.

Tell me, who dictates those inputs and parameters?

There isn't going to be a Robocop moment where it overcomes its governing dictums and turns on its OCP masters. Though, I would in fact, buy that for a dollar.

 

[Yaarel]

AI can only generate outputs based on what's been fed into it and the parameters dictating those inputs' uses.

You are describing AI today.

Not ten years from now. Not twenty years from now.

In the first race between a horse and an engine, the horse won.

 

[eyeheartawk]

You are describing AI today.

Not ten years from now. Not twenty years from now.

In the first race between a horse and an engine, the horse won.

You know, I hope you're right.

Let me just say though, that I have yet to lose a bet when I've put my money on man's inhumanity to man.

 

[DEFCON 1]

I can't speak for anyone else... but if my options were to live in the world we live today or live in the time of the 1920s or 1950s or 1980s... I'd take today every day of the week... even with the "existential threat of AI" looming over us.

Do some things about living in the 2020s suck? Sure. But anyone who thinks there wasn't absolute suck 20, 50, 100 years ago is just looking at our history through the rosiest of rose-colored glasses. So give me all the AI there is if it means some of my friends aren't going to be decimated by AIDS anymore because of the advances in medicine (almost all of which came through the use of computers and will continue to do so, including through the use of AI.)