Week 7

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AI is blurring reality: Hyperreal Digital Culture 

    For this week's blog, I'm focusing on the assigned reading "When AI Blurs Reality: The Rise of Hyperreal Digital Culture" from Georgia Tech. The article discusses how hyperrealistic AI content is reshaping social media, blurring the line between real human creators and fabricated AI personas. Something that really stuck with me was this idea that influencers can now exist without ever being real people. I remember years ago there was debate over a social media celebrity that goes by the name of Miquela, and people went back and forth over wether she was real or not. Went people realized she was an AI character, it was somewhat of a big deal, where as now, this is very normalized. An example from the article, Nobody Sausage, a AI character with over 30 million followers and brand deals. Although these AI influencers create content and interact with fans, they do not physically exist. 
     I also was very intrigued with the talk about misinformation. Deepfakes of Taylor Swift are becoming more and more popular and Mark Ried warns that stories generated by AI can easily persuade people through "narrative transportation" where audiences stop questioning truth because they feel drawn into the story. This increases the risk of both political misinformation and identity manipulation.
    The reading also highlights the mental health concerns of this AI takeover. Professor Choudhury explains that hyperreal AI content can distort the sense of reality for users, especially among those already feeling socially isolated. The fake personas mimic emotional expression so well it becomes difficult for users to decipher what is genuine and what is not. Issues like anxiety and epistemic trust, our ability to believe what others present as true, arise as serious problems. 
    This article made me realize that hyperreal AI content is nothing new, but is becoming a more serious problem, and reflects a cultural shift that affects trust, identity, and how we interpret reality online.

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