Video killed the radio star, and now AI is making a play to kill the video star. FastStream Interactive, a TV tech designer, announced today that it would begin using AI-generated video presenters on ROXi, its free, interactive music channel, per The Hollywood Reporter. ROXi is currently available in 31 U.S. markets including D.C., Seattle, and Las Vegas, via broadcast partners Gray and Sinclair (as if we haven’t heard about the latter enough the past few weeks). The AI VJs will also appear in the U.K. and Ireland.
FastStream introduced the robotic new “hosts” in a video (below) to give a little taste of how they’ll be used. They look about as real as AI “actress” Tilly Norwood, so take from that what you will. In a particularly dispiriting clip, one of the “hosts” steps into the illustrated world of A-ha’s “Take On Me” and intones that the video’s “3,000 pencil drawings took 16 weeks to make. It was all worth it.” At least the robot is right about one thing—the “Take On Me” video rules precisely because of all the human effort that went into it.
FastStream’s list of investors includes some familiar names. Robbie Williams and Kylie Minogue have both backed the technology, along with U2 bassist Adam Clayton, former U2 manager Paul McGuinness, Simon Cowell, and both Gray and Sinclair.
The company’s CEO, Rob Lewis, is particularly excited about the development. “With AI we can have ROXi presenters introducing Beyoncé from a yacht moored off her favorite Caribbean Island without having to hire and fly in a production team or charter the yacht,” he said in a statement. He did note that “we understand why some actors and presenters are worried about AI,” but—without really saying anything to assuage those very real concerns—argued that the industry needs to embrace “AI-generated talent and interactive TV experiences if we’re to attract younger viewers on TV.” “It would simply be impossible to have TV presenters providing contextualised and personalised segments” for ROXi’s entire catalog of videos “at this scale, using traditional production techniques,” he added in an email to THR. ROXi does exclude “all unlicensed AI-generated music from its catalog.” That’s where the company draws the line.
Equity, the British Actors’ trade union, isn’t satisfied with that breakdown. “Whether it’s an AI actor or AI TV presenter, real human data inputs are used to train AI systems and generate these digital assets. Performers’ work and likeness must not be scraped, stolen or illegally processed,” the guild said in a statement to THR. “ROXi rightly mentions the importance of music rights holders being ‘properly licensed and remunerated’ – this must extend to the performance data used to create the AI presenters. The Wild West of AI performance creation cannot continue to rip off performers for the profits of private tech companies whose businesses may put them out of work.”
