What if Netflix or Hulu let you automatically create a new episode of the show you were watching? No more waiting weeks (or months or years) for a new episode! Fable Studios is making this sci-fi dream a reality with their revolutionary new streaming service: Showrunner.
Launched on 30 May 2024, Showrunner is the world’s first AI-generated streaming service. Just type in a brief prompt, and you can generate anything from short scenes to entire episodes, complete with dialogue, voices, a consistent plot, and various camera angles. And if you want more control, you can further tweak the script, change camera angles, and choose new voices. It’s all up to you!
Showrunner Will Launch With 10 Animated Shows and Users Can Create Their Own Episodes
Users who sign up for the Showrunner waitlist will be the first to get access to a lineup of 10 animated shows. These include Shadows over Shinjuku, a detective noir anime set in 1930s Japan, Pixels, a light-hearted family comedy about the lives of AI-powered devices, and Exit Valley, a South Park-esque satire of Silicon Valley, among many more. But here’s the best part. You can take these shows as a starting point and create your own episodes in their style. So, you can watch an episode of Exit Valley and then type a prompt like, “The characters break into Tim Cook‘s house and force him to make a calculator app for the iPad,” and voilà! That’s your next episode.
How Generative AI Will Impact Television?
GPT models went from GPT-1, which could only handle simple tasks, to ChatGPT with over 100 million users generating code and writing essays in just five years. Generative AI for video is on a similar trajectory. Showrunner serves as an exciting entry point for people who want to make their own TV episodes but lack the necessary resources or don’t quite know how or where to begin. It empowers anyone, regardless of experience, to become a showrunner.
In the future, Showrunner could expand beyond its first 10 shows and become a platform that lets users create their own versions of popular shows. Imagine making Season 3 of Mindhunter focused on the BTK Killer, new episodes of Sherlock, or even redoing the ending of Game of Thrones. The possibilities are endless! You could also watch episodes created by others, with likes, shares, and recommendation engines pushing the best content. Eventually, AI-generated episodes may become so effective, affordable, and personalized that they could take over the entire television market.
Does This Mean the End of the Entertainment Industry?
Announcing our paper on Generative TV & Showrunner Agents!
Create episodes of TV shows with a prompt – SHOW-1 will write, animate, direct, voice, edit for you.
We used South Park FOR RESEARCH ONLY – we won’t be releasing ability to make your own South Park episodes -not our IP! pic.twitter.com/6P2WQd8SvY
— The Simulation (@fablesimulation) July 18, 2023
One major fear, which was a big reason behind the Hollywood strikes in 2023, is that AI may take over the entertainment industry, and render writers and actors obsolete. However, the more realistic scenario is that people will just get bored of AI-generated content. Showrunner has a novelty factor right now. Initially, everyone will jump in and churn out content with varying levels of quality. Everyone will likely create their own episodes and try to share them, but nobody would be interested in watching them — they will be busy watching the episodes they generate. Eventually, people will get bored because what’s the point of making something just for yourself? The bar for creation has been set too low.
People will lose interest fast. This isn’t just hypothetical. Back in June 2023, Fable released an AI-generated South Park episode to test the waters for Showrunner. And while the episode looked scarily real at first, the cracks soon began to show. The jokes were bad, the voices were off, and everyone spoke with the blank intonation of the automated AI voice.
Perhaps, it is a good thing. Great movies like The Fall Guy and Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga are failing at the box office, and the movie industry needs all the help it can get right now. Showrunner exists as a reminder that the algorithms are even worse at making stuff than we are. If the prospect of endless, bland AI-generated content doesn’t drive us back to appreciating well-crafted stories from talented storytellers, nothing will. Check out this guide on Sony’s streaming service.
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