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Speaker 1: Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news.

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Speaker 2: Access to fresh food is not it's not socialism. It

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Speaker 2: is it's a bare necessity need for any giving fee.

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Speaker 2: So this notion of socialism is not and this is

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Speaker 2: not a handout.

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Speaker 3: This is just a helping hand I'm Stacy Vanix Smith

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Speaker 3: and I'm Max Schaffkin.

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Speaker 4: And this is everybody's business.

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Speaker 5: Your group, Chat's favorite financially oriented podcast. Indeed, well, you

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Speaker 5: know we have to find our niche. Today on the show,

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Speaker 5: we have two really interesting stories.

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Speaker 4: A first one is a big one. It is affordability.

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Speaker 4: We take a look at a state run grocery store.

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Speaker 5: There are more and more of these around the country.

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Speaker 5: We're going to take you inside one in Atlanta.

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Speaker 6: When you when you highlight the key necessities people need,

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Speaker 6: like produce, milk, eggs, bread, stuff like that, I think

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Speaker 6: that we are We're beating our competitors.

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Speaker 3: And then it's.

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Speaker 7: A totally new category. When you use it to tell

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Speaker 7: stories that otherwise could not exist, people don't really care

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Speaker 7: that it's AI if they like the story.

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Speaker 8: I sat down with filmmaker Matt Zion about how AI

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Speaker 8: is changing Hollywood or might change Hollywood in the future.

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Speaker 8: One of the big questions that will hang over this

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Speaker 8: segment that I'm talking about with Matt Zion, but also

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Speaker 8: other parts of this show is I think, what is

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Speaker 8: the difference between art and slop?

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Speaker 3: Where does slop become art? Where does art become slopped?

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Speaker 4: Question for the ages, It's a question I think about

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Speaker 4: all the time, so Max.

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Speaker 5: One of the things that we've been talking about for

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Speaker 5: as long as the show has been a show has

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Speaker 5: been inflation. It's just been one of the biggest economic

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Speaker 5: stories of this moment, and affordability, all the affordability problems

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Speaker 5: that inflation is causing. People are struggling to afford the

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Speaker 5: basics more and more. We just got savings numbers out

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Speaker 5: those are near the lowest levels they've been And a

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Speaker 5: new CNN poll found that sixty one percent of people

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Speaker 5: have changed what they buy at.

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Speaker 4: The grocery store because food costs are rising so much

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Speaker 4: right now right.

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Speaker 8: And that is both obvious because prices are high, obviously

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Speaker 8: people are going to change what they buy, but also

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Speaker 8: very bad economically. That is a warning sign. And here

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Speaker 8: in New York this has been a big issue Mayor

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Speaker 8: Mom Donnie. Part of the way he got elected is

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Speaker 8: talking about affordability, and one of his solutions is the

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Speaker 8: idea that the city will operate grocery stores. This has

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Speaker 8: been super controversial, a lot of people on social media

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Speaker 8: and elsewhere saying it's ten amount of socialism. But the

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Speaker 8: plan is to have a city run grocery store opening

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Speaker 8: next year. And again, lest you think that this is

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Speaker 8: some kind of crazy, fringe New York thing, this is

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Speaker 8: happening in other places in the United States too. In fact,

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Speaker 8: one in Atlanta just opened last year. It's called Azalea

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Speaker 8: Fresh Market.

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Speaker 6: Hey, on the phone with the espresso people now, so

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Speaker 6: do I.

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Speaker 3: Put them on pause? Yeah?

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Speaker 9: Just put them on the back.

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Speaker 5: Yeah, Okay, We're very lucky today we've got the general

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Speaker 5: manager of Azaleam Market, that's Jada Mura, and the CEO

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Speaker 5: and president Palmnaire.

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Speaker 3: Welcome, thank you, thank you for having us.

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Speaker 10: Thank you.

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Speaker 5: And Jada, you just got off the phone apparently with

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Speaker 5: an espresso company because you are trying to negotiate. This

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Speaker 5: is apparently the day to day workings of what you do.

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Speaker 5: Can you tell us a little bit about what you

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Speaker 5: were asking them about?

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Speaker 3: Sure?

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Speaker 6: So right now we are going through a transitional period

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Speaker 6: for upstairs area on the first floor. We have a

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Speaker 6: full fledged grocery store where you have your fresh food,

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Speaker 6: your produce, your meat, your frozen and it's in a

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Speaker 6: very compact space. So the previous location here was a

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Speaker 6: wal grain So if you can imagine the sizeable walgrains

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Speaker 6: and take the entire floor and turn it into a

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Speaker 6: grocery store, that's the space that we're dealing with. We've

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Speaker 6: renovated it completely. We have our own Mayt to Order restaurant.

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Speaker 6: So when we opened up the facility, there was a

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Speaker 6: coffee shop that we tied in with and then High

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Speaker 6: Roller Sushet and the coffee shop has decided that they

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Speaker 6: are relocating, so we are trying to transition into our

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Speaker 6: own coffee branding. So right now I was on the

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Speaker 6: phone just trying to make sure that we have all

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Speaker 6: the proper machinery because I do have a breef stuff.

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Speaker 6: There's training right now, so we're just make sure that

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Speaker 6: we can get on the ground running for next week.

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Speaker 6: That way we're not missing out on too much money.

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Speaker 5: I read that you had more than seven hundred people

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Speaker 5: come to this grocery store.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, can you talk.

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Speaker 5: A little bit about what the store is and why

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Speaker 5: so many people showed up.

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Speaker 11: The store is for the neighborhood.

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Speaker 6: We're in a downtown area and there's really not many

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Speaker 6: areas around in the country that have a grocery store

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Speaker 6: in the part of downtown. And then on top of that,

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Speaker 6: we're also in Atlanta we have GSU. They are a

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Speaker 6: main customer base. We really serve students. It really it

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Speaker 6: is a food desert down here, and our goal is

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Speaker 6: to be able to supply the food desert with a

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Speaker 6: fresh food resource.

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Speaker 2: This is a huge initiative from the Mayor's office in

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Speaker 2: West Atlanta to address this food desert.

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Speaker 3: This sheet.

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Speaker 2: Now, when you hear about this world food doesert, people

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Speaker 2: think that, hey, it's a racial it is a you know,

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Speaker 2: it's a divide.

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Speaker 3: It's not.

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Speaker 2: I mean, it's actually every In fact, I was having

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Speaker 2: a discussion with somebody from New Jersey. They have fifty

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Speaker 2: nine food deserts, So that means that fifteen nine areas

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Speaker 2: two to three mile radio there is no grocery stores

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Speaker 2: at all. So this this is a big task be taking.

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Speaker 3: This is a public private partnership.

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Speaker 8: You know, we're dealing We're talking about some of this

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Speaker 8: in New York as well with with this plan of

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Speaker 8: Mayor Mom Donni's to open a city run grocery store

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Speaker 8: or maybe more than one city run grocery store. And

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Speaker 8: I don't know if you know this, but many people

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Speaker 8: out in the world find this very upsetting, right they

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Speaker 8: see this as the first step in the in the

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Speaker 8: slide towards communism. I for when I'm surprised that you

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Speaker 8: are not wearing your chairman Mao outfits or what you

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Speaker 8: seem like normal capitalists as far as I can tell,

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Speaker 8: can you talk about exactly what you know, exactly what

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Speaker 8: the relationship is and kind of like what your reaction like,

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Speaker 8: kind of how you see this conversation around city and

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Speaker 8: grocery stores.

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Speaker 2: Sure you know that, and that is a beautiful question,

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Speaker 2: and I do like to address it head on. You know,

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Speaker 2: when when uh, when this when we been in the

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Speaker 2: thick of building this, we actually had a call from

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Speaker 2: Mayor Mom Danny's office asking how we did what we did,

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Speaker 2: and we made it very clear, you know, it should

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Speaker 2: not be a city ran operation because city employees doesn't

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Speaker 2: know how to run retail outlets. So we've we've actually

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Speaker 2: discussed that now talking about socialism, you know, access to

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Speaker 2: fresh food is not.

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Speaker 3: It's not socialism. It is it's a bare.

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Speaker 2: Necessity, the need for any human being, so for for us,

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Speaker 2: for someone to clean. And by the way, just on

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Speaker 2: this one, this is not a handout from the city.

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Speaker 2: What we have is a small grant and the rest

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Speaker 2: everything else is loan that you're supposed to pay back.

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Speaker 2: So this is capitalism at best. So we are making

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Speaker 2: sure that this becomes sustainable and pay back the loan.

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Speaker 2: So this is this is the only difference in this

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Speaker 2: is the city is acting more like a bank, so

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Speaker 2: the underwriting is a little bit more easier, and it's

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Speaker 2: a low interest, so we can we can make it

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Speaker 2: affordable to the people who shopping. So this, this notion

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Speaker 2: of socialism, is not and this is not a handout.

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Speaker 3: This is just a helping hand.

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Speaker 4: How does your pricing and I guess your selection compare.

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Speaker 6: When you when you highlight the key necessities people need,

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Speaker 6: like produce, milk, eggs, bread, stuff like that. I think

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Speaker 6: that we are we're beating our competitors. Half a loaf

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Speaker 6: of white bread for a dollar seventy nine. I sell

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Speaker 6: chicken breast for four ninety nine pound. We have a

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Speaker 6: half dollar milk for two dollars and eighty five cents and.

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Speaker 11: It doesn't make a dollar sixty's flying.

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Speaker 3: It might be worth it to fly to Atlanta from

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Speaker 3: New York. We would love to host you.

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Speaker 6: It's crazy. We were selling a dozen eggs for a

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Speaker 6: dollars sixty nine. There's there's not many areas where you

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Speaker 6: can get fresh products for that price. And we go

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Speaker 6: buy Paul's price promise, so it's under his name, but

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Speaker 6: we do have key items in the store where we're

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Speaker 6: guaranteeing your price no matter what our cost is.

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Speaker 11: Now, obviously our.

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Speaker 6: Goal would be to not lose more money than we're spending,

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Speaker 6: but the investment is in the community.

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Speaker 8: Before we go any further on on the grocery prices,

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Speaker 8: and because the context here and one of the reasons

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Speaker 8: we want to talk to you is there was a

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Speaker 8: poll that showed that a lot of people are changing

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Speaker 8: their buying habits because of rising prices. Is a huge issue,

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Speaker 8: you know, not just run the poics in New York,

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Speaker 8: but in the country. We wanted to get a quick

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Speaker 8: sense of how our listeners were feeling. And our producer,

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Speaker 8: Miles J. Herzenhorn, was in Chicago. He went out on

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Speaker 8: the streets to ask people how they were feeling about

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Speaker 8: grocery prices.

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Speaker 3: Let's all listen together and then we can talk about this.

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Speaker 12: What is the last thing you bought at a grocery

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Speaker 12: store that gave you pause?

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Speaker 4: Oh, ground beef.

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Speaker 13: Says that used to be forty nine cents a pound

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Speaker 13: are now a dollar nineteen.

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Speaker 14: Wanted to cook a rabbi one day? One rib i

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Speaker 14: fake was like twenty nine dollars.

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Speaker 12: What do you think about the current level of grocery

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Speaker 12: prices at the moment?

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Speaker 13: Grocery prices at the moment are absolutely ridiculous. I mean,

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Speaker 13: you can't walk into a grocery store and buy anything

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Speaker 13: for less than five dollars. You know, what used to

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Speaker 13: cost you a week's work of shopping one hundred, one

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Speaker 13: hundred and twenty dollars is now well over two hundred dollars.

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Speaker 13: I truly don't know how families can.

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Speaker 11: Afford to eat.

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Speaker 12: Do you currently budget for food?

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Speaker 3: Yes?

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Speaker 2: I do.

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Speaker 13: Before I used to go in and just go shop,

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Speaker 13: being in, buy whatever I wanted to buy, and because

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Speaker 13: that's what I wanted. Now I find myself shopping for

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Speaker 13: what sun sale, what's the house brand which is costing

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Speaker 13: less than everything? Else, which is not a way I

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Speaker 13: used to shop.

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Speaker 14: I get groceries and enough items to cook that will

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Speaker 14: last for a few days. So normally I'm cooking like

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Speaker 14: maybe twice a week and making the meal stretch.

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Speaker 12: And how do you think other families around the country

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Speaker 12: are managing the affordability crisis?

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Speaker 11: What do you think they're doing?

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Speaker 14: I honestly feel that families across the country they're budgeting,

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Speaker 14: They're trying to plan out their meals. There no snacks,

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Speaker 14: no junk foods, things that are actually going to last

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Speaker 14: for a good bit of time.

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Speaker 13: Honestly, I think they're charging it and getting deeply in debt.

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Speaker 3: Scary.

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Speaker 2: Yes, this is I actually I hear this just about

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Speaker 2: every day, even you know, I was the other day,

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Speaker 2: I was outside Walmart just kind of talking to people.

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Speaker 2: What the similar kind of questions? And it is it is.

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Speaker 2: It is strange a minute, it is bad, and you know,

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Speaker 2: and again this the fuel pricing. It's a combination of

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Speaker 2: different things, right, I mean, it's not just one thing

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Speaker 2: that attributes to the situation. So I believe once the

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Speaker 2: gas prices comes down, I think things may level off.

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Speaker 2: But unfortunately, the issue is COVID has changed a lot

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Speaker 2: of things, how the pricing has been set, and you know,

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Speaker 2: is that a lot of profit taking into these things.

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Speaker 2: I can't say no to that. So it's a combination

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Speaker 2: of different things, and this is something that needs to

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Speaker 2: be addressed.

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Speaker 3: Are you seeing you've been open for a year or so,

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Speaker 3: have you seen shifts and how in what people are

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Speaker 3: spending money on or are you seeing sort of those

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Speaker 3: efforts to save in terms of like what people are buying,

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Speaker 3: passing up, choosing or not choosing in kind of your stores.

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Speaker 11: I think you do see shifts.

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Speaker 6: I think that the the biggest thing in grocery is

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Speaker 6: if people think that they're saving money, you have a

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Speaker 6: bigger chance that.

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Speaker 11: They're going to make that purchase.

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Speaker 6: I could mark up the price of cheese its and

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Speaker 6: I could do buy one, get one fifty percent off,

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Speaker 6: and just off of the thought that oh, I'm saving

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Speaker 6: money on cheeses, then that's that's the more likely purchase

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Speaker 6: than the.

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Speaker 11: Ones that are not discounting.

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Speaker 6: So you do see people that are attracted more to

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Speaker 6: advertised sales the private brands, like they mentioned in the video,

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Speaker 6: just speaking on the options that are the cheapest, you

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Speaker 6: do kind of see a trend but I do think

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Speaker 6: the biggest trend that I've seen is the payment method.

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Speaker 6: So instead of paying with credit or cash, my electronic benefit.

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Speaker 11: Charges are starting to go higher. They're about forty of

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Speaker 11: our purchases.

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Speaker 8: So electronic benefits. That's food stamps, yeah, yeah, food stamps snap.

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Speaker 4: How does your business model work? Do you make a profit?

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Speaker 4: Do you not? Because you're charging really I very low prices.

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Speaker 2: So traditionally, you know what happens if there is low

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Speaker 2: pricing and let's say the margin is twenty percent and

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Speaker 2: the shrink is two percent, So what happens is you

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Speaker 2: mark it up twenty two percent to make up the difference.

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Speaker 4: What is the shrink? What does that mean?

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Speaker 3: Shrink could be theft or breakage?

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Speaker 4: Oh okay, okay, that doesn't so just losses.

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Speaker 2: So you mark up the twenty two percent to make

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Speaker 2: up the difference. You know, we're not doing that, and

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Speaker 2: so our to answer the question, we want to be profitable. Yes,

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Speaker 2: that's exactly what we are running for. So we're looking

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Speaker 2: at different other sources. What else can we do? What

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Speaker 2: are the services we can bring in? So that's the

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Speaker 2: ways in data is aggressively negotiating with different coffee companies.

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Speaker 2: We're hoping to be profitable pretty soon, so at least

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Speaker 2: at a minimum breaking.

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Speaker 5: Well, what do you hear from your customers? Like, what

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Speaker 5: feedback have you gotten from them over the last year.

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Speaker 6: Before we opened, we had some some lapses in the

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Speaker 6: opening time, so we ended up pushing it until September,

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Speaker 6: but we had to define an opening day I believe

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Speaker 6: in late August, and then had to push it back,

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Speaker 6: push it back, push it back. And our first upset

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Speaker 6: customers were the ones that weren't able to come into

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Speaker 6: the door.

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Speaker 11: We had people that were leaving us Google reviews already

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Speaker 11: about oh you guys, had you open at this time

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Speaker 11: and you're not.

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Speaker 6: We want a shop, So our first customers were people

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Speaker 6: that were didn't ending to be able to take advantage

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Speaker 6: of our facilities.

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Speaker 11: So now that we're here, we're here to say and

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Speaker 11: we're here commun to do all.

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Speaker 8: Right, Jada and Paul, general manager and CEO of Azalea Market,

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Speaker 8: thank you so much for being here.

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Speaker 3: Stacey and I will definitely come visit and.

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Speaker 5: By threatening to get on a plane some of that

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Speaker 5: espresso once you get this chain all worked out.

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Speaker 2: But up Max, we're going to hold you to that

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Speaker 2: waiting until I Love It for a month long shehof shopping.

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Speaker 3: Stacy.

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Speaker 8: Two weeks ago or so, I had a conversation, fascinating

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Speaker 8: conversation on stage at the Artist and Machine Conference. This

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Speaker 8: was an event in in Brooklyn about AI and creativity

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Speaker 8: with this guy, Matt Zion, who is an AI filmmaker.

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Speaker 8: You and I we've talked all about AI and how

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Speaker 8: it's changing things. I haven't talked I don't think that

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Speaker 8: much about the entertainment business. That's kind of where this

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Speaker 8: conversation is located. There are obviously lots of people who

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Speaker 8: are using AI in Hollywood right now to sort of

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Speaker 8: like touch up scenes or make crowds look better or whatever.

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Speaker 8: Matt's thing is like using only AI. I mean, it's

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Speaker 8: like the most sort of out there version of this.

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Speaker 8: I mean, in fact, so out there that the kind

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Speaker 8: of central question in this conversation is sort of like

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Speaker 8: what is the difference between AI art and AI slop? Like,

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Speaker 8: at what point does it become art when you're just

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Speaker 8: you know, prompting a computer to generate something. And then

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Speaker 8: the other reason I think this is a cool conversation

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Speaker 8: is because, like I said, Matt is really good at

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Speaker 8: prompting AI at basically asking AI questions. And I found,

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Speaker 8: even though, as you know, I'm somewhat skeptical of this stuff,

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Speaker 8: I actually found this conversation somewhat useful in terms of, like,

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Speaker 8: how can somebody get the most out of their experience

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Speaker 8: with AI? Because he is really he's pushing these things,

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Speaker 8: you know, kind of to the limits.

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Speaker 4: I'm excited to hear the conversation.

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Speaker 3: Let's give it a listen.

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Speaker 8: And I thought to start, we could just see a

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Speaker 8: short clip from what is this?

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Speaker 3: This is like your first ever AI movie.

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Speaker 9: Twenty twenty four. Wow, going way back, runway Jen three.

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Speaker 3: Okay, this is called the Relic.

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Speaker 15: Daring Expedition in the bar of plan.

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Speaker 3: On the podcast, we're seeing a shot from a plane.

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Speaker 15: What could possibly drive these military gos? Why?

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Speaker 8: None of it looks like an old newsreel.

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Speaker 3: We see some guys and restore peace.

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Speaker 15: Hello, little monkey. Our heroes are not alone in that quest.

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Speaker 15: But this relics has been guarded for thousands of years

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Speaker 15: by a noble drive, the keepers of this ancient wonder.

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Speaker 8: All right, So for people who didn't watch that old thing,

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Speaker 8: it's like a sort of newsreel style report from world

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Speaker 8: War two. How did you come to be a person

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Speaker 8: who made this? Like, like, what's the story that led

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Speaker 8: you to make that film?

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Speaker 16: At the time, I had just discovered mid Journey, which

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Speaker 16: had just moved out of Beta and Runway, and I'm

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Speaker 16: just trying really really hard to get into Runways beta,

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Speaker 16: and it was like, Okay, what can we make that

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Speaker 16: is actually watchable with where the tech is now and

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Speaker 16: those old newsreels. I was it like, they're all the

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Speaker 16: footage is already really grainy and bad, so maybe we

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Speaker 16: could sell it. But the thing that was the hardest

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Speaker 16: was to make them walk, Like it was really really

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Speaker 16: hard to make them walk, and when they kind of

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Speaker 16: started to walk, usually they'd become glitches very very quickly.

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Speaker 16: And it's kind of amazing how far and how quickly

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Speaker 16: it's come since being super excited that they could walk

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Speaker 16: and not become like a glitch monstrosity.

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Speaker 8: Yeah, I mean we'll see some of the more advanced

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Speaker 8: clips that, like you said, it's been very quick, just

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Speaker 8: matters of months or a year. Just take us back

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Speaker 8: to like what caused you to get interested in the

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Speaker 8: space in general? Coming from a sort of more traditional

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Speaker 8: I mean, you've been basically producing what documentaries?

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Speaker 16: Yeah, nonfiction series and documentaries for over ten years, and

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Speaker 16: nonfiction is a very entrepreneurial, scrappy part of the business,

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Speaker 16: with lower budgets than scripted, much lower. And the thing

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Speaker 16: that bothered me the most as it development executive was

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Speaker 16: we'd have these meetings where we came up with ideas,

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Speaker 16: and there were all these ideas we'd fall in love with,

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Speaker 16: and we knew our friends at the networks would love them,

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Speaker 16: and we knew what the audience would love them, but

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Speaker 16: we had to throw them away right away. We couldn't

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Speaker 16: even speak because it cost too much. We would never

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Speaker 16: get those budgets. And as I saw this improving rapidly,

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Speaker 16: I thought this would solve the problem that has bothered

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Speaker 16: me the most through my whole career, which is incredible

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Speaker 16: stories that deserve to be told but could not be

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Speaker 16: told otherwise.

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Speaker 3: You were like, let me, I'm in this world of

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Speaker 3: documentary and non.

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Speaker 8: Facial let me take the most synthetic thing. I'm just kidding, Yeah,

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Speaker 8: no recreations. I mean epic scale things set in the

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Speaker 8: ancient world or the beginning of time, following Neolithic humans

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Speaker 8: as they developed language. There's so many incredible stories that

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Speaker 8: would be just so much fun to watch, but there

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Speaker 8: is an archival for them. What was the reaction you

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Speaker 8: put this on YouTube? Is that how you showed it

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Speaker 8: to the world. Start on TikTok okay. I put this

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Speaker 8: on TikTok and uh, there's a lot of like cool.

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Speaker 8: But then there was someone who really they told me

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Speaker 8: to kill myself and I was shocked. Well, I want

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Speaker 8: to get into that and into the into the way

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Speaker 8: that people have been reacting. And and I think it's

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Speaker 8: super easy to be in place like this and and

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Speaker 8: or in you know, a corporate boardroom where there's also

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Speaker 8: a lot of AI enthusiasm, and and miss the fact

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Speaker 8: that if you pull people about this stuff, a lot

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Speaker 8: of people will be the opposite of enthusiastic.

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Speaker 3: Right, They're gonna be the they're they're in the kind

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Speaker 3: of hater camp.

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Speaker 8: So you've been you've been dealing with this, right, putting

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Speaker 8: stuff out there that is really cool on a sort

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Speaker 8: of technical level, like oh my god, I can't believe

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Speaker 8: that you can make this with a computer, and getting

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Speaker 8: some blowback, and you've been responding to that. And let's

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Speaker 8: watch the next clip. This is called Forgive the Haters.

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Speaker 10: Good old Machus mortgage everything for film school head seven

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Speaker 10: years around and hain't painted off yet. His professors promised

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Speaker 10: if he learned the rules master composition, lighting, all the tools, heat.

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Speaker 9: The value low, computer could repleach. Now you watch his

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Speaker 9: prompts with wonder on the face.

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Speaker 11: Forgive the hate.

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Speaker 9: They're not what they see.

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Speaker 13: They're watching the death.

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Speaker 10: They're American dream. Forgive the hate, see them true.

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Speaker 8: Never seeing some of the comments including slops, garbage, crap,

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Speaker 8: I assume that's a real surial comments, uh not an

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Speaker 8: AI generated one that we know of. What was talk

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Speaker 8: about the motivation to make this and I'm curious about

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Speaker 8: the composition, like are you what if? For people who

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Speaker 8: are just listening to this, what we saw is sort

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Speaker 8: of like an eighties rocker, like an arena rocker singing

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Speaker 8: that song, and some eighties style workers who are reacting

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Speaker 8: to AI.

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Speaker 16: We this actually ties back to the collaborative way of

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Speaker 16: working with AI that I mentioned before. To get to

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Speaker 16: this song, I told Claude I was I pretended I

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Speaker 16: tricked Claude into thinking I was the haters, okay, And

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Speaker 16: I compiled my worst hate comments and was like, help

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Speaker 16: me get this AI filmmaker, like this is what I

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Speaker 16: wrote to them, and Claude like built a case against

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Speaker 16: me because if you just ask it straight up, like

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Speaker 16: if I was like, hey, these are my haters, it'd

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00:22:51,680 --> 00:22:52,240
Speaker 16: be like, oh, they're.

445
00:22:52,119 --> 00:22:54,679
Speaker 8: Idiots, right, because it wants you to keep using it

446
00:22:54,680 --> 00:22:55,800
Speaker 8: the sycophancy problem.

447
00:22:55,920 --> 00:22:59,119
Speaker 16: I reversed the sycophancy, so I was a hater and

448
00:22:59,160 --> 00:23:01,520
Speaker 16: then I was like whoh, and it really broke down

449
00:23:01,560 --> 00:23:07,080
Speaker 16: what people were angry about and fearful of. That hit

450
00:23:07,160 --> 00:23:10,919
Speaker 16: me and I was like, these are this is a

451
00:23:10,960 --> 00:23:15,480
Speaker 16: real disruption, and I understand where these emotions are coming from,

452
00:23:15,800 --> 00:23:17,119
Speaker 16: and I want to make art about it.

453
00:23:17,680 --> 00:23:22,880
Speaker 8: The characters there's a visual effects artist, there's a film professor, screenwriter,

454
00:23:22,960 --> 00:23:24,960
Speaker 8: or it's a bunch of people who are dealing with

455
00:23:25,560 --> 00:23:28,879
Speaker 8: the kind of economic fallout or confronting it in various

456
00:23:28,880 --> 00:23:33,560
Speaker 8: ways emotional ways, economic ways. The song is talking about

457
00:23:33,640 --> 00:23:38,720
Speaker 8: these complaints, the idea of a screenwriter can't find work

458
00:23:38,760 --> 00:23:41,159
Speaker 8: or something like that, and for the most part, like

459
00:23:41,200 --> 00:23:42,040
Speaker 8: that isn't true.

460
00:23:42,119 --> 00:23:44,600
Speaker 3: Like I was on a panel or here earlier, where.

461
00:23:44,359 --> 00:23:47,760
Speaker 8: On the stage people are saying like actually, and this

462
00:23:47,800 --> 00:23:50,400
Speaker 8: comes up in other domains around AI, Right, you think

463
00:23:50,440 --> 00:23:53,600
Speaker 8: it's gonna lead to massive job losses. But it hasn't

464
00:23:53,720 --> 00:23:55,679
Speaker 8: yet and it may never. But in your work it

465
00:23:55,880 --> 00:23:57,919
Speaker 8: is right, I mean, it is just you. There is

466
00:23:58,000 --> 00:24:02,720
Speaker 8: no AI screenwriter that that singer is a bot, there's

467
00:24:02,720 --> 00:24:04,240
Speaker 8: no actor being paid it.

468
00:24:05,400 --> 00:24:08,760
Speaker 3: It is in some sense taking away those jobs. Does

469
00:24:08,800 --> 00:24:09,960
Speaker 3: that give you any kind of pology?

470
00:24:10,119 --> 00:24:12,240
Speaker 9: Yeah? The thing is, I don't know if it is.

471
00:24:12,640 --> 00:24:15,919
Speaker 16: I don't know of any production that was using people

472
00:24:16,000 --> 00:24:19,720
Speaker 16: before and has now let those people go to use AI.

473
00:24:20,040 --> 00:24:23,040
Speaker 16: I can't think of one. Maybe that will happen in

474
00:24:23,040 --> 00:24:25,240
Speaker 16: the future, but I haven't seen it yet. When people

475
00:24:25,240 --> 00:24:30,159
Speaker 16: look at AI filmmaking, they think it's a replacement. They

476
00:24:30,160 --> 00:24:33,160
Speaker 16: immediately think it's a replacement for practical production or animation.

477
00:24:33,680 --> 00:24:36,240
Speaker 16: But the way I see it is it's a totally

478
00:24:36,320 --> 00:24:40,160
Speaker 16: new category. It is a new medium entirely that can

479
00:24:40,200 --> 00:24:43,320
Speaker 16: do different things than either of those mediums. And when

480
00:24:43,320 --> 00:24:46,880
Speaker 16: you use it as a replacement, audiences don't really respond.

481
00:24:47,440 --> 00:24:48,399
Speaker 16: When you use it.

482
00:24:48,680 --> 00:24:52,800
Speaker 9: To tell stories that otherwise could not exist, people don't

483
00:24:52,880 --> 00:24:55,600
Speaker 9: really care that it's AI if they like the story.

484
00:24:56,200 --> 00:24:58,920
Speaker 8: When you hear your colleagues in the entertainment world, like

485
00:24:58,960 --> 00:25:02,840
Speaker 8: Germel de Toros saying like, I'd rather die than use AI.

486
00:25:02,960 --> 00:25:05,480
Speaker 8: I mean, like, so these are not just randos on

487
00:25:05,520 --> 00:25:07,879
Speaker 8: the internet slinging at you, right.

488
00:25:07,800 --> 00:25:10,520
Speaker 16: I'd be really honored if he's slaying at me, really right,

489
00:25:10,680 --> 00:25:13,119
Speaker 16: and I respect him. But it's also very easy to

490
00:25:13,160 --> 00:25:15,240
Speaker 16: say I'd rather die than use this when you're sitting

491
00:25:15,240 --> 00:25:17,600
Speaker 16: on one hundred and thirty million dollar budget, when you're

492
00:25:17,600 --> 00:25:20,560
Speaker 16: trying to climb your way up as a filmmaker and

493
00:25:20,960 --> 00:25:22,600
Speaker 16: the industry is already contracting.

494
00:25:23,240 --> 00:25:24,840
Speaker 9: You're gonna do what you gotta do to get your

495
00:25:24,880 --> 00:25:27,320
Speaker 9: story in the world. You use the.

496
00:25:27,440 --> 00:25:29,440
Speaker 3: Sort of distinction between art and slop.

497
00:25:30,280 --> 00:25:32,280
Speaker 8: I can't remember when we were Backstager just now, but

498
00:25:33,240 --> 00:25:36,000
Speaker 8: there's a lot of what I think is more clearly

499
00:25:36,080 --> 00:25:38,240
Speaker 8: like AI slop that is doing very.

500
00:25:38,080 --> 00:25:38,960
Speaker 3: Well on the internet.

501
00:25:39,000 --> 00:25:40,760
Speaker 8: Like I was not even gonna bring this up, but

502
00:25:41,080 --> 00:25:42,600
Speaker 8: so many people have brought it up. When I said, oh,

503
00:25:42,600 --> 00:25:45,320
Speaker 8: I'm doing a panel and AI filmmaking these fruit Love

504
00:25:45,359 --> 00:25:51,040
Speaker 8: Island videos. Yes, it's like a very successful TikTok where it's.

505
00:25:50,920 --> 00:25:54,040
Speaker 3: Like a parody of Love Island, but they're fruit.

506
00:25:54,480 --> 00:25:56,159
Speaker 8: The visuals are so We're gonna put one up, but

507
00:25:56,160 --> 00:25:59,879
Speaker 8: the visuals are so garish we're worried about offending people.

508
00:26:00,280 --> 00:26:04,920
Speaker 3: What do you make of that and the success of it.

509
00:26:05,000 --> 00:26:07,080
Speaker 16: I think the thing that's doing really well that is

510
00:26:07,119 --> 00:26:10,560
Speaker 16: an AI in practical production is human slop too.

511
00:26:10,960 --> 00:26:13,080
Speaker 9: Everyone's talking about real shorts.

512
00:26:13,000 --> 00:26:17,400
Speaker 16: And these like one minute like like absolutely horrible soap operas,

513
00:26:17,760 --> 00:26:21,800
Speaker 16: these vertical soap operas, and that's crushing it. Like human

514
00:26:21,840 --> 00:26:24,600
Speaker 16: slop and AI slop are both doing really well in

515
00:26:24,680 --> 00:26:25,680
Speaker 16: terms of numbers.

516
00:26:25,800 --> 00:26:28,200
Speaker 3: We talked about the slop end of the spectrum.

517
00:26:28,240 --> 00:26:30,920
Speaker 8: I want to play one last clip of your work,

518
00:26:30,960 --> 00:26:35,080
Speaker 8: a recent piece that is I think maybe and maybe

519
00:26:35,119 --> 00:26:36,800
Speaker 8: you correct me if I'm wrong, but it feels like

520
00:26:36,800 --> 00:26:40,760
Speaker 8: the most fully fleshed out like film. It's a twelve

521
00:26:40,760 --> 00:26:43,719
Speaker 8: minute short film. It's called DJ. We're gonna watch a

522
00:26:43,760 --> 00:26:45,119
Speaker 8: short clip and then talk about it.

523
00:26:46,040 --> 00:26:50,480
Speaker 11: Then they still just drop in loneliness.

524
00:26:50,960 --> 00:27:00,800
Speaker 1: Huh they die of loneliness? What they cured everything? Accept

525
00:27:00,800 --> 00:27:04,480
Speaker 1: the part where they can't talk to nobody, can't say

526
00:27:04,480 --> 00:27:09,840
Speaker 1: they're sad, so their bodies just quit.

527
00:27:15,040 --> 00:27:17,560
Speaker 3: Okay. So that was a shot of a few characters

528
00:27:17,600 --> 00:27:18,280
Speaker 3: in a car.

529
00:27:18,640 --> 00:27:21,760
Speaker 8: Three women. They're like agents of some sort. They're going

530
00:27:21,800 --> 00:27:25,280
Speaker 8: into this futuristic nightclub. I'm not gonna spoil the whole story,

531
00:27:25,320 --> 00:27:29,119
Speaker 8: but I wanted to ask you, Matt, you've talked about

532
00:27:29,200 --> 00:27:31,880
Speaker 8: casting these actors, what do you mean.

533
00:27:31,720 --> 00:27:34,040
Speaker 3: By that AI is a probability cloud.

534
00:27:34,480 --> 00:27:36,280
Speaker 16: When you ask for an image, it's going to give

535
00:27:36,320 --> 00:27:39,920
Speaker 16: you the most likely image that it can make from

536
00:27:39,920 --> 00:27:44,479
Speaker 16: the probability cloud. But interesting characters you have to wrestle

537
00:27:44,520 --> 00:27:47,960
Speaker 16: with the machine. You have to put constraints in, So

538
00:27:48,359 --> 00:27:52,120
Speaker 16: I like to use paradoxes that force the model into

539
00:27:52,160 --> 00:27:55,400
Speaker 16: the edges of its training data, so it gives you

540
00:27:55,560 --> 00:28:00,679
Speaker 16: people that are not the most statistically average output. And

541
00:28:00,720 --> 00:28:03,200
Speaker 16: then it's really just a human judgment thing. You look

542
00:28:03,480 --> 00:28:05,960
Speaker 16: and see if that person is compelling, and if they're

543
00:28:05,960 --> 00:28:08,760
Speaker 16: compelling enough, you moved them to the next stage where

544
00:28:08,760 --> 00:28:11,640
Speaker 16: you design a voice. You design a voice for each

545
00:28:11,760 --> 00:28:14,560
Speaker 16: character and make sure the voice matches, and then you

546
00:28:14,560 --> 00:28:17,400
Speaker 16: put it into video and you audition your own creations

547
00:28:17,760 --> 00:28:20,520
Speaker 16: until it's something that you feel holds the screen. They're

548
00:28:20,560 --> 00:28:21,960
Speaker 16: compelling enough to hold the screen.

549
00:28:22,440 --> 00:28:24,440
Speaker 3: Where are we in this culture battle?

550
00:28:24,520 --> 00:28:24,639
Speaker 9: Like?

551
00:28:24,840 --> 00:28:28,160
Speaker 3: Do you think the intensity of this debate is gonna?

552
00:28:28,440 --> 00:28:30,520
Speaker 3: Have we hit the peak? Is it just starting? What

553
00:28:30,560 --> 00:28:31,600
Speaker 3: are you all happening right now?

554
00:28:31,640 --> 00:28:33,560
Speaker 16: I'll tell you what I saw last night on Reddit

555
00:28:33,640 --> 00:28:36,000
Speaker 16: that kind of shocked made me really worried for a minute.

556
00:28:36,680 --> 00:28:40,320
Speaker 16: There are subreddits that are all about AI hate, and

557
00:28:40,880 --> 00:28:42,840
Speaker 16: one came up on my feed that was a photo

558
00:28:44,000 --> 00:28:48,440
Speaker 16: for a billboard of a small Mexican restaurant in a

559
00:28:48,520 --> 00:28:54,640
Speaker 16: four hundred person town in Washington State, and the caption was,

560
00:28:55,600 --> 00:28:59,880
Speaker 16: look at this cringe AI slop on the billboard. I

561
00:29:00,120 --> 00:29:03,200
Speaker 16: The thing I thought immediately was, Oh, no, this family

562
00:29:03,240 --> 00:29:05,960
Speaker 16: restaurant is about to get brigaded. I looked at the

563
00:29:06,040 --> 00:29:09,920
Speaker 16: Yelp expecting to see hundreds of like horrible reviews, but

564
00:29:10,000 --> 00:29:11,960
Speaker 16: I just saw five star reviews and it was like

565
00:29:11,960 --> 00:29:14,760
Speaker 16: the best Mexican food anyone had ever had. But I

566
00:29:14,920 --> 00:29:17,080
Speaker 16: was and the person who drove by and posted that

567
00:29:17,120 --> 00:29:18,960
Speaker 16: would never try that. But that's the kind of thing

568
00:29:19,000 --> 00:29:19,680
Speaker 16: you're worried about.

569
00:29:19,800 --> 00:29:23,080
Speaker 8: That's this thing i've heard of building into the real world. Yeah,

570
00:29:23,120 --> 00:29:25,440
Speaker 8: we've seen that, of course, with some attacks on some

571
00:29:25,640 --> 00:29:29,760
Speaker 8: AI industry executives and so on. Last question, real quick,

572
00:29:29,840 --> 00:29:32,880
Speaker 8: do you worry about your own the role that you're playing,

573
00:29:32,920 --> 00:29:35,600
Speaker 8: about disrupting yourself or whatever, Like the idea that this

574
00:29:35,600 --> 00:29:37,920
Speaker 8: could get so good that like that artist.

575
00:29:37,760 --> 00:29:40,960
Speaker 16: Vision wouldn't be needed, not not at all. No, I,

576
00:29:42,040 --> 00:29:45,480
Speaker 16: this is so much fun. The community that does it

577
00:29:45,560 --> 00:29:49,720
Speaker 16: is the warmest community I've ever found in film. This

578
00:29:49,960 --> 00:29:53,640
Speaker 16: is not going away and it's only going to get better.

579
00:29:53,800 --> 00:29:55,360
Speaker 16: We say all the time, this is the worst it

580
00:29:55,360 --> 00:29:55,840
Speaker 16: will ever be.

581
00:29:57,040 --> 00:29:59,360
Speaker 8: Matt Zion, thank you so much for being here, Thank

582
00:29:59,360 --> 00:30:00,000
Speaker 8: you all for listening.

583
00:30:00,080 --> 00:30:01,240
Speaker 3: Name great conversation.

584
00:30:10,440 --> 00:30:14,760
Speaker 5: All right, Max, So, in the spirit of the conversation

585
00:30:15,000 --> 00:30:19,719
Speaker 5: that you just had and this idea of creating art

586
00:30:20,000 --> 00:30:25,040
Speaker 5: with AI, there has been sort of a summer song

587
00:30:25,840 --> 00:30:29,320
Speaker 5: moment that we have had that is is a collaboration

588
00:30:29,440 --> 00:30:34,000
Speaker 5: between a person and AI. So it's called the Puerto

589
00:30:34,120 --> 00:30:37,280
Speaker 5: Rico Song. It is totally blown up in the last

590
00:30:37,320 --> 00:30:38,520
Speaker 5: few weeks it was written.

591
00:30:38,680 --> 00:30:40,719
Speaker 3: Are you saying this is the underrated story?

592
00:30:41,040 --> 00:30:41,280
Speaker 11: Yeah?

593
00:30:41,320 --> 00:30:44,000
Speaker 4: I think it is underrated, Yes, because even though it's

594
00:30:44,000 --> 00:30:46,440
Speaker 4: blown up, is the song of the summer.

595
00:30:46,800 --> 00:30:49,640
Speaker 5: It's been on TV, like, it's on Spotify, like this

596
00:30:49,720 --> 00:30:52,320
Speaker 5: has like become this thing. It was and how it

597
00:30:52,360 --> 00:30:55,479
Speaker 5: happened was there was this comedian and he likes to

598
00:30:55,600 --> 00:30:57,760
Speaker 5: travel and when he comes back, he takes his travel

599
00:30:57,760 --> 00:30:59,360
Speaker 5: notes and likes to write song.

600
00:30:59,200 --> 00:31:01,440
Speaker 4: Lyrics and then he feeds them into this.

601
00:31:01,400 --> 00:31:05,400
Speaker 5: AI tool called Suno, and Suno creates a little song

602
00:31:05,400 --> 00:31:07,800
Speaker 5: around the lyrics. He's done this on a bunch of

603
00:31:07,840 --> 00:31:10,880
Speaker 5: places that he's traveled, and he went to San Juan

604
00:31:11,680 --> 00:31:17,000
Speaker 5: and he wrote a song with AI and it has

605
00:31:17,080 --> 00:31:20,440
Speaker 5: become this big hit. Are you ready to hear the song?

606
00:31:21,000 --> 00:31:21,560
Speaker 3: I'm ready?

607
00:31:21,720 --> 00:31:22,800
Speaker 4: All right, here we go.

608
00:31:32,880 --> 00:31:34,560
Speaker 3: First time in Sana.

609
00:31:34,240 --> 00:31:40,080
Speaker 9: Juan, Puerto Rico.

610
00:31:41,720 --> 00:31:47,440
Speaker 3: Immediately, this song sucks, Stacy. I'm sorry. It is a bad,

611
00:31:48,120 --> 00:31:51,719
Speaker 3: bad song. It is not the song of the summer.

612
00:31:52,200 --> 00:31:55,920
Speaker 5: Puerto Rico is flying him out to become This is

613
00:31:55,960 --> 00:31:57,560
Speaker 5: going to become the promotional song.

614
00:31:57,960 --> 00:31:58,520
Speaker 3: I hope it does.

615
00:31:58,840 --> 00:31:59,520
Speaker 11: Puerto Rico.

616
00:32:00,080 --> 00:32:00,840
Speaker 5: People love this.

617
00:32:00,960 --> 00:32:01,600
Speaker 3: That's funny.

618
00:32:01,640 --> 00:32:04,479
Speaker 8: Is from Puerto Rican There are I mean, this is

619
00:32:04,520 --> 00:32:07,840
Speaker 8: not even the song you got to get off the internet,

620
00:32:07,960 --> 00:32:10,400
Speaker 8: I think honestly, because this is this is not the

621
00:32:10,440 --> 00:32:11,240
Speaker 8: song of the summer.

622
00:32:11,760 --> 00:32:14,840
Speaker 4: This is blowing up. People love the song. It's very fun,

623
00:32:15,040 --> 00:32:18,800
Speaker 4: it's very sweet. It's I don't know. You didn't even

624
00:32:18,840 --> 00:32:19,960
Speaker 4: listen to it for ten.

625
00:32:19,840 --> 00:32:23,719
Speaker 3: Seconds, I have to say, and I have to admit this.

626
00:32:23,840 --> 00:32:26,240
Speaker 8: I feel like I failed as a podcaster, which is

627
00:32:26,280 --> 00:32:29,640
Speaker 8: that I listened to this beforehand, So I think I

628
00:32:29,680 --> 00:32:32,720
Speaker 8: went into the listen with a little bit of bottled

629
00:32:32,800 --> 00:32:36,800
Speaker 8: up rage that that unfortunately may happen. Rage about what

630
00:32:37,400 --> 00:32:40,800
Speaker 8: I feel like. We're like grading AI on a curve.

631
00:32:41,120 --> 00:32:44,720
Speaker 8: We're like, oh, like, it's so this is it's so catchy,

632
00:32:44,800 --> 00:32:45,400
Speaker 8: but it's is.

633
00:32:45,320 --> 00:32:46,120
Speaker 2: It catchy though?

634
00:32:46,160 --> 00:32:47,240
Speaker 3: Like I'm not totally sure.

635
00:32:47,560 --> 00:32:48,400
Speaker 4: I think it's catchy.

636
00:32:48,440 --> 00:32:51,360
Speaker 8: All right, Well, speaking of people who need to get

637
00:32:51,360 --> 00:32:54,840
Speaker 8: off of the Internet, I have been following the Enhanced Games,

638
00:32:54,920 --> 00:32:57,880
Speaker 8: which is the quote unquote steroid Olympics.

639
00:32:57,920 --> 00:33:01,200
Speaker 3: Ceacy. You and I have talked about the Enhanced Game before.

640
00:33:01,960 --> 00:33:06,760
Speaker 8: It was this kind of like Silicon Valley attempt to

641
00:33:06,840 --> 00:33:11,840
Speaker 8: quote unquote disrupt the world of sport by giving elite

642
00:33:11,880 --> 00:33:13,520
Speaker 8: athletes drugs.

643
00:33:14,000 --> 00:33:16,640
Speaker 3: Okay, you're familiar with the Enhanced Games, right, Uh?

644
00:33:16,720 --> 00:33:19,200
Speaker 8: Yes, Okay, So I've been founding this closely because, as

645
00:33:19,240 --> 00:33:22,040
Speaker 8: I said, I've been spending too much time on the Internet, and.

646
00:33:23,600 --> 00:33:25,280
Speaker 3: Everyone was sort of expecting that.

647
00:33:25,240 --> 00:33:27,880
Speaker 8: It would be this, you know, like, oh my god,

648
00:33:27,920 --> 00:33:30,120
Speaker 8: like world records are going to fall and so on.

649
00:33:30,560 --> 00:33:31,520
Speaker 3: Do you want to know what happened?

650
00:33:31,960 --> 00:33:32,560
Speaker 4: What happened?

651
00:33:32,640 --> 00:33:36,200
Speaker 3: The athletes not using the drugs were the ones who won.

652
00:33:36,920 --> 00:33:38,040
Speaker 3: Oh in many cases.

653
00:33:38,160 --> 00:33:39,920
Speaker 8: Okay, and it was kind of it was kind of

654
00:33:39,960 --> 00:33:42,840
Speaker 8: a letdown and the enhanced Games in one hundred meter

655
00:33:42,960 --> 00:33:45,960
Speaker 8: in the men's hundred meters, they were talking about taking

656
00:33:46,000 --> 00:33:49,400
Speaker 8: down Usain Bolts record. The guy who won was number one,

657
00:33:49,440 --> 00:33:51,760
Speaker 8: not on drugs, and number two did not run very fast.

658
00:33:52,120 --> 00:33:55,800
Speaker 8: There was one world record in swimming in the men's

659
00:33:56,520 --> 00:33:59,440
Speaker 8: fifty meter, but it's sort of unclear.

660
00:33:59,040 --> 00:34:01,160
Speaker 3: Whether it was the drugs or whether it was one

661
00:34:01,160 --> 00:34:04,400
Speaker 3: of those suits. Do you remember those suits that Olympian

662
00:34:04,480 --> 00:34:06,640
Speaker 3: Olympic swimmers were wearing for a while, in the speed suit,

663
00:34:06,680 --> 00:34:07,320
Speaker 3: the speed suits.

664
00:34:07,320 --> 00:34:09,759
Speaker 8: He was wearing one of these speed suits, and so

665
00:34:09,800 --> 00:34:11,520
Speaker 8: it's like, maybe it was a speed suit, maybe it

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Speaker 8: was a drug, but they did.

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Speaker 3: Set a record there.

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Speaker 8: Anyway, Wall Street has been unimpressed that the stock basically

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Speaker 8: went public right before.

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Speaker 3: This and it has not been well.

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Speaker 8: The last I checked, it was down seventy percent from

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Speaker 8: its high about.

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Speaker 3: A month ago, so a bit of a dud.

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Speaker 8: This show is produced by Jasmine J. T. Green, Stacey Wong,

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Speaker 8: and Miles J. Herzenworth. Magnus Henrickson is our supervising producer.

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Speaker 8: Ken Militzer handles engineering, and Dave percellfact checks special Thanks

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Speaker 8: to Jeff Muscus.

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Speaker 3: Julia Rubin, and Ria Lingk.

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Speaker 8: If you have a minute, please rate and review the show.

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Speaker 8: It'll mean a lot to us. And if you have

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Speaker 8: a story that should be our business, email us at

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Speaker 8: Everybody's at Bloomberg dot net. That's everybody with an s

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Speaker 8: at Bloomberg dot net. Thank you for listening, and we

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Speaker 8: will see some