Ep 138 Creativity: The Era of Creatives and Copycats: AI’s Impact on Design

In this episode of The Crazy One, Stephen Gates dives into the impact of AI on the creative industry. With AI tools making waves in design, writing, and coding, Stephen shares his perspective on how these technologies are changing the game—and why creatives should embrace them rather than fear them. Discussing the differences between real creativity and mere replication, he highlights the role of AI in making high-quality work accessible to everyone and the rise of copycat designs. Stephen offers insights on how to stand out, the ethical implications of AI, and why, in the end, creativity and storytelling will continue to matter. If you’re wondering how AI will affect your work and your career, this episode provides the clarity you need to navigate this brave new world.

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Transcript

What's going on, everybody? And welcome into the 138th episode of the Crazy One podcast. As always, I'm your host, Stephen Gates, and this is the show where we talk about creativity, leadership, design, win, and a whole lot of other stuff that matters to creative people. Now, as always, do me a favor. Leave a review, tell a friend, send up a smoke signal, send carrier pigeon whatever works for you.

But do me a favor. Tell your friends about the show, especially if you find it useful. So I broke down. I had a moment of weakness. Decided that I'm going to give in. Finally do a show about AI. Now, look, if you think this is one of those shows, you're going to get all the details, what tools you use, what platforms to use, what my workflow is, all of that stuff.

There's about a 45 or so minute video that's sitting over on my YouTube channel that goes through all of that. I just want to talk about this from a little bit of a higher level. How am I thinking about it? How do I think it's going to affect the industry? Where do I think this is going? Because I'm getting a ton of questions about it.

And look, I think I've been very public over the last three years that we've been using AI in a ton of our work. We use it in basically with every client. And I think a lot of other designers and agencies are they just aren't talking about it. But that's what I want to talk about, is to be able to get into just where's my head at is on it, where do I think it's going?

And I kind of want to skip the details, because I'm pretty sure that no episode of ever done I have done is going to date as badly as this one probably will. But let's start the very beginning. Now, I've talked about this in the past, but for me, any time there's a new technology, any time there's a new shift, any time everybody is getting all excited and running towards the new thing, which has happened from the beginning of digital, that everybody wants to go run to do something.

I do the exact same thing, which is I take the time to go out to try it, to see what it can do, to form my own opinions and to not be a sheep like too many other people have done to see. Do I think this thing's really going to change? Do I think it has value or those sort of things?

That's why I never you've never seen me recommend to one of my clients that they should do an NFT, or they should have their own cryptocurrency or a million other things that's come along in the last five, ten, 15 years that I think is going to be a fad. Now, there are things that I think are going to fundamentally change the way that we work, the way that our clients see our industry.

It changes the value or the things that I can produce or share and look, I is absolutely going to be one of those. Now, there's a whole discussion here that I'm not going to engage in around. Do we support it? Do we fight it? What do we do? Look, it's here is here to stay. Now that that goes without saying that I think probably it's about to be a fantastic time to be a lawyer.

There is a ton of stuff that needs to get figured out, because the way that some of these engines are dealing with commercial usage rights, dealing with trademark or copyright or a ton of things, right now it's the Wild West, right? It it absolutely is. And the ethics and a lot of other stuff, that's a debate we can absolutely get into.

But I think for me, just we're not going to be able to unring the bell. And it's been interesting because, you know, as we've been doing this work, I don't know that I've ever had a period in my career or a body of work that just gets so much hate as whenever I share any of the work we do with, I write tons of comments around, you're like, you're dumb, you're untalented, you don't know what you're doing.

You're lazy. I mean, look, I'm I'm not going to fight them on that opinion. I can see where it comes from. I think a lot of that is a misunderstanding of what goes into I. But I think it's also for me why I want to do this show. Because, look, I think that at the end of the day, all the details aside, whether we're talking about for text, for code, for imagery, for a lot of those sort of things, and we've even seen it lately.

Right? ChatGPT just put out their model, and everybody's making Muppets and Studio Ghibli images and all this sort of stuff, but I think there's kind of two key things, or two key thoughts that I keep coming back to whenever I think about AI. One is that like what we are in is we are in the era of what is going to be the creatives and the copycats.

And I think that's what's going to set a lot of this apart, because for me, I'm going to date myself badly. Here, look, I've done this long enough to see computers come in to disrupt the entire printing industry with desktop publishing. And what that did, I saw it again with digital. I've seen it kind of time and time again.

Is this time different? Absolutely. Is it bigger? Absolutely. But so much of the AI work that's getting done right now, and I think what everybody's very dazzled by is sort of the technical capabilities. And what we're missing out on is the creativity, the ability to tell a story, to communicate. And a lot of those things we've seen it in.

Look, I think the backlash to the Coke commercial this past holiday came out of the fact that it was more of a technical proof of concept than a good commercial or story or anything like that. But that's what there is a flood of right now, is there's a flood of it's given the average person the ability to do something that looks high quality and often taps into a cultural vein.

Right. So again, I think if you want to make a muppet or a Simpsons character or a Studio Ghibli character or anything like that, now every single person can do it with some pretty minimal technical expertise, right? So I think that wall broke down. I think that for me, though, whenever I look at this, I look at it as a tool set or something like that, because the piece that still has to be there is the originality is the creativity is the thinking is who is coming up with the Studio Ghibli style to begin with, who is coming up with the story to tell or The Simpsons or the stuff that all of this stuff

is based on and that that isn't going to go away now. Is it going to disrupt how we tell stories? Is it going to disrupt what the skill sets of all of us look like? Absolutely. But for me, that's kind of why I'm leaning into this, because I've also seen too many other technologies, whether it's crypto or NFTs or other ones like that, where you can tell creatives have not been in the room when these tools have been developed, like I just I've never been able to escape the fact that, like, a wallet is the wrong construct to use when you talk about crypto, right?

Like I understand why they did it, but it it just makes it so much harder to understand for most people. And so for me, it's the place I'm like, look, I want to be here, I want to engage in this and I want to be able to do that. But like it, it's going to change things. And like I said, for me it's about getting in, engaging with it, seeing what the tools can do, finding new ways of working with clients.

And again, we try to do our best to figure out the ethics and a lot of the other things behind it. So I'm not glossing that over, but I think that at the core, maybe the thing that bothers me the most, maybe the thing that bothers you the most, is, I think what AI is doing is it's while it is letting a lot of people celebrate creativity and the ability to create and have fun, I think it's also really bringing front and center.

How many companies and how many people just don't value design. They don't value creativity. They don't value what we do. And if they can replace a writer with ChatGPT, if they can replace a designer with an AI, they'll just copy another website. They will. And I think for me, that's what this is really kind of drug up. And maybe that's the part that doesn't get talked about enough, is that there are absolutely legal ramifications that come with that.

But that's what we're seeing is I think it's that the darker side, the uglier side, the part where we felt devalued, the part where as creatives, we felt like we've had to continue to struggle to find our seat at the table and do those things. Now, this is like nightmare fuel for that conversation. And we've seen it. We've seen how many companies are willing to ship bad product to ship, like stuff that just you can tell they used AI and it's trash and they just don't think most people care.

And if they can get away with it, they'll try. And I think we're going to go through a period where people are going to need to see that, at least for right now, I there's a lot that it can do, but there's a lot that it can't do. It does get very formulaic. You can start to really spot it when you see it.

I can spot it when I see a writing sample. I can spot it whenever I see design that. It isn't this magic bullet that everybody thinks that it is, and that, as usual for too many companies, what happens is that leaders think that they have a really solid understanding of what something is. But in a very short time, in a very short conversation, you can just sort of understand that they think that, you know, by they wrote one ChatGPT prompt and they're now an expert in AI.

And so a lot of this is being driven by cost savings. A lot of this is being driven by greed or laziness or a lot of other things. I think I'm already seeing a ton of creatives that are falling into this trap where, you know they won't read the brief, they need to give it to ChatGPT to summarize it, or turn to a podcast or do something else.

And so there's a trap here for both sides. I think companies are trying to see if they can get do more with less, if they can be a little bit lazier, if they can see what the audience will take in terms of devaluing design and originality. But then that's the thing is, it's also on us as well that I do think too many creatives right now are just they are they're going into Midjourney, they're going into, you know, clang or whatever it is, and just writing the prompt and just sort of letting happenstance and letting the, the AI kind of come back with whatever that creativity is, that moment is going to pass.

Right? The business results are going to show it works in some places. It's not going to work in a lot that I think that we're going to start to see a lot of this, and I think it's already happening, starting to look pretty homogenized ized, and that what's going to emerge out of that is going to be the creatives, the storytelling, the doing, the things that are a little bit more differentiated, doing something that connects or stands out.

Because what stands out today, all this, you know, interesting new imagery. I mean, what just come on. Like, let's look at that Studio Ghibli imagery that got old three days, tops. The same thing that everybody went to go make an action figure. Three days, four days tops. And then everybody else who always sort of lags behind went in and did it.

But so, yeah, the ability to create something and that somehow our attention spans are probably going to find a way to get even shorter, which is just nuts. But but I think that that's the thing is that for so many of us, it's forcing a reckoning for us to really look at our level of creativity, our level of storytelling, our ability to look at and value business, to be able to say, okay, look, how are we going to create something?

Because it is going to disrupt a huge part of more of the commoditized production, part of the industry. And like I said, I, I saw it, you know, entire studios closed. I saw whenever, you know, type setters and people that did pay stub keys and like all that sort of stuff where, you know, out of work whenever all of a sudden computers came along.

That sounds so like an old fart. Whenever I say that, God, I don't feel that way. But but that's the thing is that I think that, look, it's going to make an impact. People are going to use it badly. I think right now we're absolutely seeing a place where there's a contraction that is going on in design and it's partially the economy, but a big part of it is I and, you know, I think I've continued to say it, and I still believe it, that I don't think AI is going to take your job if you can show up and understand what your value is and be creative and tell a story and do those

sort of things. But I do think somebody who's use knows how to use AI will take your job, because, look, I think we can rage against it. We can do a lot of those sort of things. I have my issues with it in a lot of places. But I mean, for me, though, it is a it's a fascinating tool to work with.

I think the ability to be able to produce proofs and concepts and ideas or explorations to do it more collaboratively, to do it more quickly, to be able to bring much higher production quality to clients that don't have as big of a budget or like a lot of those sort of things. But I think for me, that's the thing, is that most of the hate that I'm seeing, I think is either coming out of fear of people who just they don't want to get comfortable being uncomfortable, they want to keep doing what they've been doing.

And look, I continue to firmly believe that comfort is the enemy of greatness, that at the end of the day, we all have to constantly evolve. Is it happening more quickly? Yes. Is it coming with a lot of bad behavior from a lot of companies? Absolutely. But I think that's the thing is that, you know, for me, the ability to be a part of the conversation for seeing what it is to take some level of comfort.

Now, look, this show may age super badly and we'll find out. But I think, you know, for me, I take comfort in the fact that I know how to connect brands to consumers. I know how to find unique stories. I know how to create strategies that will differentiate our clients from everybody else. And I think that continuing to lean into that, to recognize that there's going to be more of a premium on live events, on things that are real, whether it's sports or concerts or in-person or because for me, this is going to be another wave of the way everybody sort of got burnt out on social media.

I don't think you have to be psychic to see that. That's going to be not far off as well. But as we go through this period and as we normalize it just for me, go in and see what it can actually do, try it form your own opinion, like listen to mine, but don't make my opinion yours. Go out, see where you can actually try this out.

Try out the tools. Understand what it can do. Understand where it can't do. Understand what it's good at. Understand where it sucks at. Right? Because I think as you look for, how do you integrate it to make your work better? As you look at how do I figure out my career path in a day, in a time where a lot of the perception of design creativity may be under siege, I just, I don't know, I and maybe this is because I've gone out on my own and I've gotten away from corporate America.

I just kind of refuse to give in to this. You know, all of this gloom and doom about like, design is dead and creativity is dead and our industry is going to go away. And like, I mean, look, I know that it's good for fear mongering. I know it's good for clickbait. I know it's good for a lot of that stuff.

But for me, it's just it's just kind of a laughable discussion. I guess in a lot of cases, it's just conversations. I, I guess I'm just not that interested in, in engaging with as opposed to saying, okay, look, I would rather go out to understand it to be a voice who's going to help shape it, to be able to go out and look at what is that, to help other people figure it out.

But and again, I think, you know, for me, maybe it's a little bit of a different perspective because I've spent I don't even know how long. What's it been, ten years, 15 years, maybe more going out and talking to companies, doing keynotes, talking about like, there's going to be a day where if we can't really lean into our creativity, if we can't really say why it is where unique, if we don't really understand the value we bring and on and on and on, that we're going to be in trouble.

I didn't see this left in Albuquerque coming with it, but I think the principle still applies. I mean, honestly, it's one of the reasons why I don't do that many public talks anymore, because the number one talk I've given has worked for 15 years. Like it's great and it gets me booked and people like the talk. But you know how depressing it is.

The same point and the same stuff is work for that long because it means people aren't listening. Right? Or we come, we take a bunch of notes, we go, and then we go back to doing the exact same thing. But again, it's a moment of transformation. I think you can either see it as a moment of gloom and doom or a moment of opportunity.

And for me, and I know a small group of others, that's what I want to lean into. I think especially because for me, what I find so fascinating is that so many, so many of the most resistant people to I are the more senior people, the people who are better at creativity, the people who are better at, you know, directing photo shoots or video shoots or doing a lot of these things and that give you so much of the skills of curation and collaboration and the other things like that that will make you really good in, in kind of that era of working with AI.

But like, look, I know people are still going to be afraid. I know there's still going to be haters. I know there's so be going to be people who and look, I hope it does value real photography more. I hope it does put more of a premium on people who are creative, who can do something different, who can execute really well.

Because that's why I said is like in an era where everything is going to become so sort of homogenize because of, you know, again, that I look it gives you the opportunity to stand out, but you need to understand how and where to stand out for that to happen. So just a hot take. Like I said, there may be an episode that I do that never ages worse than this one is going to do, but just go and form your own opinion, right?

Go and try things for yourself. I think. Try to find a grip to the fact that, you know, look, for so many of us, the fact that the devaluing of design is not something new, is it more to the surface than it was before? Of course. Is there going to be more rampant copycats? And there's going to be, of course.

But those people are still going to turn to trends and campaigns and creativity and ideas and other things like that, to find the inspiration and to find what to copy. So that's our job is to get ourselves and our work into a place where we are the ones that are doing those things and not falling into the category of the ones that are just copying.

I'm going to climb down off my soapbox now, but look, let me know what you think. Maybe you know, am I? Have I been working alone and talking to the dog for too long? Am I just sitting too close to my monitor? My brains turn to the scrambled eggs, but let me know. Like I said, I'm genuinely interested to be able to have a debate about this.

And again, I'm happy to do, you know, office hours, meetup, anything else to be able to kind of talk it through because I know there's a lot of hope. I know there's a lot of fear. I know there's a lot of emotion. I know there's a lot of bad behavior that's associated with all of this. And look, I just think for me, this is that moment where you need more community, not less.

You need more discussion, not less. We need more people helping in kind of useful, constructive conversations, not less, but like I said, who knows, maybe I'm sitting too close to my screen. So hey, thanks for listening. Let me know what you think. And as always, stay crazy.