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posted by martyb on Tuesday July 21 2020, @02:19PM   Printer-friendly
from the alternate-history dept.

A Nixon Deepfake, a 'Moon Disaster' Speech and an Information Ecosystem at Risk

What can former U.S. president Richard Nixon possibly teach us about artificial intelligence today and the future of misinformation online? Nothing. The real Nixon died 26 years ago.

But an AI-generated likeness of him shines new light on a quickly evolving technology with sizable implications, both creative and destructive, for our current digital information ecosystem. Starting in 2019, media artists Francesca Panetta and Halsey Burgund at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology teamed up with two AI companies, Canny AI and Respeecher, to create a posthumous deepfake. The synthetic video shows Nixon giving a speech he never intended to deliver—half a century after the subject it addresses.

Here's the (real) backstory: In July 1969, as the Apollo 11 astronauts glided through space on their trajectory toward the moon, William Safire, then one of Nixon's speechwriters, wrote "In Event of Moon Disaster" as a contingency. The speech is a beautiful homage to Neil Armstrong and Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin, the two astronauts who descended to the lunar surface—never to return in this version of history. It ends by saying, "For every human being who looks up at the moon in the nights to come will know that there is some corner of another world that is forever mankind."

The full deepfake speech can be viewed at https://moondisaster.org.


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  • (Score: 2) by DannyB on Tuesday July 21 2020, @04:47PM

    by DannyB (5839) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday July 21 2020, @04:47PM (#1024641) Journal

    The real Nixon died 26 years ago.

    Can you be sure? I saw video of him?

    If Elvis didn't die, how can you be so sure Nixon actually died?

    Of course, Hollywood makes fakes all the time. From what I've seen in theaters, we've sent many manned missions to Mars. We've invented AI robots. And Sharknadoes are a real threat we must all take seriously. Not to mention zombies. And not the kind you kill with htop.

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    People today are educated enough to repeat what they are taught but not to question what they are taught.
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