Tilly Norwood creator: everyone’s investing in AI despite the stigma

Tilly Norwood creator Eline van der Velden has urged the PSBs to increase their investment in AI despite the negative connotations around the technology – suggesting that working with AI is akin to admitting to having an STD. 

Van der Velden’s AI actor Norwood rose to global prominence last year, prompting Hollywood actors and key industry figures to push back at the fast-growing software and its potential impact on the creative sector. 

But the Particle 6 chief executive told the opening session of the Edinburgh TV Festival that she had signed “hundreds of NDA’s” with companies around the world as firms ranging from US studios to local indies look to adopt AI into their processes. 

“There aren’t many boardrooms we haven’t been invited into,” she said, adding that she knew “how much companies are working with AI behind the scenes.”  

The problem, she joked, is that “saying you’re working with AI is like saying you have a STD, no one’s wanting to admit that.” 

Van der Velden urged UK-based PSBs to shrug off the stigma and invest in training staff in AI ensure the country remains a creative force. 

“There is a huge arms race going on here. Britain has been a creative powerhouse because we can create as we want to,” she continued, adding that the tech should be seen as “a whole new medium” and not be employed as a cost cutting exercise. 

Joshua Barnett, chief exec at Sister Group’s recent acquisition After Party Studios, said his company had used AI on the creative deck for The Ultimate Football Challenge hosted by Jürgen Klopp, while James Duncan, co-founder at ShxtsNGigs, said he was not worried about AI-created content usurping his YouTube audience. 

The tech offers an additive to human creation, he suggested, adding that its best use at present is for “things we can’t physically do” and AI-generated videos of “humans doing four backflips off a mountain” wouldn’t be popular. 

Brand power increasing and PSBs need support 

Across a far-reaching session, Duncan and Barnett also pointed to the growing opportunities of working with “the thousands of brands acting like commissioners, not just the handful of digital commissioners,” as the After Party boss put it. 

Barnett added that PSBs attempts to focus on younger audiences by commissioning shows for YouTube had to concentrate on platform-specific content rather than creating “mass appeal, vanilla” shows. 

There was also broad support for the PSBs, with Fozia Khan, head of unscripted at Amazon MGM Studios UK, admitting that they are vital in providing new talent. 

“We’re all part of the same ecosystem,” she said. “We all need off screen talent and freelancers, it is really important to support that because a lot of them are coming through the PSB’s. We’re all interconnected.” 

Barnett added: “Everything that is happening is staving off what is inevitable - in a few years there won’t be channel one or two, there will be apps.” 

Asked if he would support greater prominence for the BBC, he said: “Yes, fund the BBC and invest in the workforce. They have to play in all the pockets. If it keeps the BBC around for longer, if they keep employing people producing UK focused content, then I don’t mind.” 

Matthew Belloni, journalist and founding partner at US podcast Puck, added that the BBC remained the most trusted news brand in the US and urged its defence. “Do whatever you can to save it,” he said.