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

[Oofta]

In the parable, there isn’t actually an emergency, and the boy is just saying it as a prank, so no one believes him when there is a real emergency. That’s not really analogous to this situation, because Chris Cocks has actively been discussing his intent to monetize D&D and mentioning D&D in discussing how Hazbro is looking in to utilizing AI.

Of course they’re looking into AI, just like every other large company. That doesn't make it a wolf.

 

[Charlaquin]

So where have there been any indication of it being true or an issue? I could just as easily claim they're using 5G transmissions to to control our buying. I'm not reaching for my tinfoil hat and I won't be concerned about microtransactions (or nefarious use of AI) until it actually happens.

In the interview we’re all discussing right now! Have you not actually read it?

 

[Oofta]

In the interview we’re all discussing right now! Have you not actually read it?

Yes I read it. We come to completely different conclusions.

 

[Micah Sweet]

So where have there been any indication of it being true or an issue? I could just as easily claim they're using 5G transmissions to to control our buying. I'm not reaching for my tinfoil hat and I won't be concerned about microtransactions (or nefarious use of AI) until it actually happens.

And that's fine. Nobody is insisting that you worry about it. But the analogy you are using is, IMO, flawed. The situation has not turned out to be nothing, as yet, and people worried about it are not, in the majority, doing so in bad faith; they are in fact honestly concerned.

 

[Charlaquin]

Of course they’re looking into AI, just like every other large company. That doesn't make it a wolf.

AI is absolutely a wolf. It’s causing real human people real suffering, at the cost of tremendous amounts of fossil energy, in order to produce torrents of slop writing and “art,” accelerating the global information literacy crisis in the process.

 

[Mistwell]

I like playing golf as one of my hobbies and the last few years a lot of the golf companies have touted the point that they are using AI in making the clubface. They say they can run millions of simulations to shape and mold the face to be able to make up for golfers not hitting the dead center of the face and help to get the ball to stay straight and go about as far. I have not noticed any backlash from golfers over using the AI in this form.

I'm not sure how Wizards will use AI, but I can guess that it is not going to be 100% bad/evil/corporate. Art and writing does appear to be a center of role-playing games and it is not like using AI to make better dice that roll more random somehow. I can see the fear of the unknown.

My kid is a competitive Irish Dancer, a type of dance which has some (but not all) objective judging elements to it. There are quiet rumors of a company maybe making an AI tool which can analyze 3d imaging of a dancer and then suggest improvements to the dance, like a dance teacher would do, but from your home while you are practicing. MANY people would eat that up, and I don't know of anyone who would complain about access to such a tool other than the cost. At least so far.

 

[mamba]

Jury appears to still be out on that, to be fair. You're not the boy who cried wolf unless and until the thing you're crying about turns out to be nothing.

how long are you allowed to do so before we can say that it was nothing without you replying ‘but any minute now’….

 

[Charlaquin]

how long are you allowed to do so before we can say that it was nothing without you replying ‘but any minute now’….

I mean, the hope is we make enough noise now that it puts the corporate suits off the idea before it gets the chance to become a thing. Just like we did with NFTs. You shout about a wolf so other people will join in the shouting and scare it off before it hurts anyone.

 

[Mistwell]

In the parable, there isn’t actually an emergency, and the boy is just saying it as a prank, so no one believes him when there is a real emergency. That’s not really analogous to this situation, because Chris Cocks has actively been discussing his intent to monetize D&D and mentioning D&D in discussing how Hazbro is looking in to utilizing AI.

You have two assumptions there: 1) Monetizing D&D is bad, and 2) Utilizing AI will be bad.

Bad is implied by you treating these, in this context by your words, as "a real emergency."

Neither of your assumptions is necessarily well founded until we actually know what the monetization and AI use look like. If the monetization is selling something I very much want, and that millions want, it's not bad. Similarly if the AI is a form which people want, it's not bad. I mentioned earlier how much use I got out of using AI to come up with inspiration and structure for details about a ritual I wanted to use in my game, as an example.

 

[Mistwell]

I mean, the hope is we make enough noise now that it puts the corporate suits off the idea before it gets the chance to become a thing. Just like we did with NFTs. You shout about a wolf so other people will join in the shouting and scare it off before it hurts anyone.

NFTs ended up having almost zero utilitarian purpose. The extremely few utilitarian purposes they had were very minor and redundant to other tools out there anyway. AI is not like that. AI is so hot right now because it has just so many actual utilitarian purposes which are not redundant. AI is just never going away. At best it will be controlled by laws in some respects. At best activism can deter or alter the use of unauthorized artworks in the originating databases. But it will never succeed in eliminating the use of AI altogether. I don't even think it could work for even the smaller field of artworks - already some companies are adapting to authorized artworks in their database and paying small royalties based on AI's use of them. It's just not going away as a thing though. Going forward everyone will, whether they even know it or not, be using or benefitting from AI in everyday life.