Often called “time traveler” videos, especially on TikTok, the AI- generated clips now bouncing around the internet get properly- known memes and include context that was n’t it before. In some cases, they “interrupt” the action, often they include a disturbing threat. In the “distracted boyfriend” animation, which was posted on X ( formerly known as Twitter ) last month, the boyfriend is seen turning around and following the girl walking in the opposite direction while his girlfriend stands nearby.
The video was created using Luma Dream Machine, an AI design that creates high-quality, practical videos using resource images and words prompts. Within weeks of its launch, social media users began utilizing images and structures from well-known memes to create visuals that put the creation skills of Dream Machine to the test. The research demonstrated that the AI model has the ability to rewrite online history by altering the most influential images on the web, despite not being perfect.
Some popular physical limitations and flaws of relational AI were revealed in the model’s output as Dream Machine became popular, including unnatural human morphing and objects that were depicted in strange ways. Some social media users found the woman’s incomprehensible problems amusing and frightening in terms of AI’s motion and potential for propaganda.
While it may be unsettling to think that one of these AI-assisted memes could become so popular that it surpassed the image that served as its inspiration, Know Your Joke director Phillip Hamilton is of the opinion that the current situation does n’t pose a significant threat to the preservation of digital media. Instead, it’s the prevalence of the copies that makes the reboots job.
” Usually, everyone knows the context”, Hamilton says, referring to the popular graphics being edited. ” The iconicness of the picture is at the base of the trend … the core of the]time- tourist ] joke is that common thing being stopped”.
User conversation with jokes is a key component of meme-sharing on social media. Editing jokes with AI is fair sport, Hamilton says because the majority are the product of enhancing at first.
Luma claims Dream Machine you produce 120 structures of high-quality movie in less than 120 seconds, despite experiencing significant delays as a result of the demand’s extreme higher levels. The rapid era, along with the presence of a “free” level that allows users to make up to 30 clips per month, have made Dream Machine much more accessible than its OpenAI counterpart, Sora, which, despite being revealed in February, has not yet been released to the public thus far.
A modified version of a 2013 Vine video where a young child incorrectly answers the question” What’s nine plus 10?” was posted on X on June 14th, by Hron. In Hron’s version, a shadow enters the room right before the boy declares his iconically wrong answer. The video, which was soundtracked by spooky music, elicited unsettling responses from both confused and curious social media users. The clip had more than 30 million views on X before Hron posted it, and as it made its way through various channels, it accumulated captions like” POV: time traveler comes to stop meme.” As more users have remade viral Vines, the “time traveler” joke has followed them, too.
The videos, often bizarre in substance, trigger the sort of body horror that comes with generative AI’s uncanny depiction of human forms and movements. Although Hron, who also makes horror games, intended for his video to have a revolting vibe, its odd visuals were merely a result of Dream Machine’s shortcomings. Other posts under the “time traveler” trend show the people in the original videos being chased by shadow figures, morphing into unrecognizable creatures, and being consumed by monsters.
” It’s a lot easier for AI to get things wrong, and that just makes them inherently scary”, Hron says.
These AI-generated graphics may not overshadow the original memes, but they represent a new wave of digital content and a new engagement pattern for social media users. What may only appear to be bizarre and unrealistic meme editing at the moment could lay the groundwork for a largely skeptical online audience, one who thinks not even memes can be trusted.
