June 4, 2025 • 51 mins
Hans confronts the technological, moral, and philosophical impacts of using Artificial Intelligence to animate still photos, including those of both personal and historical significance.
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Intro Links
- Why Academics Are Leaving Twitter for Bluesky
- This Cybersecurity Startup Is Quietly Moderating X’s Community Notes to Fight Crypto Scams
- Scam Sniffer
- Nancy Mace ran bot army, had staff run fake accounts to boost profile, report claims: ‘It’s what she does for fun’
- RFK Jr.'s MAHA Report Cites Research Studies That Don't Exist
- The MAHA Report Cites Studies That Don’t Exist
- Roblox’s Hit Farm Game Spurs Underground Digital Fruit Economy
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Animating History
- Falcon Heights, MN City Council Meeting - March 26, 2025
- Errol Morris at NYPL
- Synthesis of a Vocal Sound from the 3,000 year old Mummy, Nesyamun ‘True of Voice’
- Making a Dead Lion Roar
- Dolph Briscoe Center for American History
- Saigon Execution
- Oral History with Eddie Adams
- oldphoto.ai
- Intersubject Synchronization of Cortical Activity During Natural Vision
- Ways of Seeing
- 'I Loved That AI:' Judge Moved by AI-Generated Avatar of Man Killed in Road Rage Incident
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Never Post’s producers are Audrey Evans, Georgia Hampton and The Mysterious Dr. Firstname Lastname. This episodes contributing producer was Tori Dominguez Peek. Our senior producer is Hans Buetow. Our executive producer is Jason Oberholtzer. The show’s host is Mike Rugnetta.
Never Post is a production of Charts & Leisure
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Mike Rugnetta (00:10):
Friends, hello, and welcome to Never Post, a
podcast for and about theInternet. I'm your host, Mike
Rugnetta. This intro was writtenon Tuesday, 06/03/2025 at
08:27AM eastern, and we have aconsidered show for you this
week. In our second ever episodelength segment, Hans confronts
(00:31):
the technological, moral, andphilosophical impacts of using
artificial intelligence toanimate still photos, including
those of both personal andhistorical significance. It's an
incredible, and as you've cometo expect from Hans, incredibly
thoughtful piece, and I'm veryexcited for you to hear it.
(00:54):
And also pet sounds. But rightnow, we're gonna take a quick
break. You're gonna listen tosome ads unless you're on the
member feed. And when we return,we're gonna talk about a few of
the things that have happenedsince the last time you heard
from us. Hold on to your butts.
I've got five stories for youthis week. Academics left
(01:15):
Twitter for Blue Sky along witha lot of other people, but a new
study out of Zurich and The UKlooks at academics specifically
asking why did those whoswitched make the switch. The
researchers call Blue Sky a,quote, rare natural experiment
for studying large scalemigration from a long stable
(01:36):
platform, end quote, and findthat, quote, the transition
behavior of accounts a userfollows, followees, exerts
substantially stronger influencethan the behavior of their
followers. In other words,academics and maybe people in
general, but who knows, followinformation sources over access
(01:58):
to audiences when deciding toswitch platforms. Researchers
also found that shock events, asthey call them, account for huge
bumps in transition from oneplatform to another.
These are things like xinstituting fees, the public
launch of Blue Sky when invitecodes were no longer needed,
Brazil blocking x, and thebiggest by far, the result of
(02:22):
the most recent US election.Speaking of x, CommunityNotes'
most prolific contributor is acybersecurity startup. According
to Web three Antivirus founderAlex Dulube, the company
apparently uses a combination ofmachine learning and automation
tools to provide additionalcontext in the community notes
(02:44):
section of x posts that forwardcrypto scams, which scam sniffer
estimates cost x users nearly$47,000,000 in March of this
year. Nancy Mace, the toiletsobsessed Republican
congresswoman from SouthCarolina has apparently
commanded bot armies as well asher own staffers at the helm of
(03:09):
burners and sock puppets tocounter criticism of her online.
This according to Wired.
We had to make multipleaccounts, burner accounts, and
go and reply to comments sayingthat things weren't true even on
Reddit forums, a former staffertold Wired. We were
congressional staff and therewere actual things we could be
(03:32):
doing to help the constituents.Mace, the staffers report,
describes herself as a selftaught coder. RFK junior, the
brainworm having ist cabinethead secretary of the department
of health and human services,oversees the CDC, FDA, and so on
released his make our childrenhealthy again report as part of
(03:54):
his so called make Americahealthy again commission, and it
contains citations for researchwhich does not exist, likely
hallucinated by an LLM used togenerate the report. According
to NODIS, at least seven of thestudies cited in the report do
not exist, leading researchscientists cited to clarify that
(04:15):
the work attributed to them isnot real.
Other nonexistent studies areattributed to nonexistent
authors. And finally, Robloxgrow a garden game hit 8,700,000
concurrent users at the end oflast month. The game is a kind
of farming sim reminiscent ofAnimal Crossing in that the
(04:37):
landscape persists and changeswhile the player is away. Grow a
garden offers in game purchasesfor resources useful in the
tending of the farm, whichBloomberg reports have made
their way off platform, sellingfor inflated prices at various
digital goods marketplaces.Players of the game, which
accounts for nearly 30% ofRoblox total activity at the
(05:00):
moment, spend millions ofdollars a week buying secondhand
digital items according tomarketplace site Eldorado.GG
founder, Vladis Jorkevicius.
According to Roblox terms ofservice, however, this is not
allowed. The company has yet tostep in. That is the news I have
(05:22):
for you this week in this week'sepisode, Hans, on using
artificial intelligence toanimate the past and the
feelings that inspires. Butfirst, in our interstitials this
week, pet sounds.
Hans Buetow (05:36):
Literally. Quick notice that this segment
(06:29):
contains discussions of war,execution, and murder.
City Council Member (06:43):
Alright. Good evening and welcome to the
City of Falcon Heights CityCouncil meeting on Wednesday,
03/26/2025. We'll call thismeeting to order at 07:03PM.
Hans Buetow (06:57):
Just a couple of months ago, my wife and I
attended our first ever citycouncil meeting for our small
town. We were there along withabout probably 80 other citizens
because on the agenda that nightwas the debate on public versus
paid street parking for theMinnesota State Fair. And unlike
(07:17):
most of the food at the fair, itwas a pretty spicy night, which
started with the head of ourlocal public access TV, Jeff
Ongstad, doing an annual report.
Jeff Ongstad (07:27):
I had no idea there was this much interest in
community television. In 2025and beyond, we anticipate
another 25% increase in allcommunity coverage long form and
short form.
Hans Buetow (07:41):
I love community services like this. So I was
pretty stoked to hear aboutcovering local high school
sports and doing video for citycouncil meetings.
Jeff Ongstad (07:50):
We're also having a larger presence at community
events. So if you have eventswhere we can have a table or a
tent or something, we'd like tobe there, show some of our
stuff. We're buying a TV thatyou can play outside. So we're
excited about that.
Hans Buetow (08:04):
And then towards the end of his presentation,
things suddenly changed.
Jeff Ongstad (08:09):
And I'd like to show you just a little example.
We're embracing AI assistedproduction to enhance
capabilities we have along withspeeding up our workflow.
Hans Buetow (08:15):
Let's just pause here real quick. I want to
explain what I'm looking at inthis moment. On the screen
behind Jeff Ongstad is aphotograph that he's showing of
a group of three adult men and adozen boys who look probably, I
don't know, 10 years old.They're all in a parking lot.
You can see the tail fin of anineteen fifties car off to the
(08:36):
right.
The boys are looking in everydirection, mostly at each other.
A few of them are looking at thecamera, and, of course, one kid
in the back is blowing araspberry.
Jeff Ongstad (08:44):
Just one area that we're using is is like in old
photographs and stuff to animatethose.
Hans Buetow (08:50):
As he says this
Jeff Ongstad (08:51):
So we can take old photos like this and not only
clean them up, but then bringthem to life.
Hans Buetow (08:56):
Everyone in the picture starts to move.
Jeff Ongstad (08:59):
And that's just from an old photograph.
Hans Buetow (09:01):
Like, literally, they all just start looking at
each other. Most start smiling.A few of them, like, mouth words
to each other. One kid bendsdown. The other kids all look at
him while he does that.
Even the trees in the backgroundstart to blow lightly in the
breezes. My first thought, thisis cool. Followed by a strong
(09:23):
desire to do this with photos ofmy family, I am my generation's
keeper of the family history andobject. So I have boxes, photos
going back several generations,which I've cataloged, I've
digitized, and I could put intoAI a photo of my great
grandfather who I'm named after,but who died before I was born.
(09:45):
And this man who I never metwould smile at me.
And I immediately think of ourfriend contributing producer
Tori Dominguez Peek, who lastyear filed a story for us about
(10:07):
companies who are trying to gether to make AI representations
of her dead mom for Mother'sDay. And Tori's piece focused on
what feels like to reanimateyour dead family members with
AI. And even though she'sconfident that she doesn't want
to do that, she doesn't want tobuild an AI version of her mom,
I'm not so sure.
Errol Morris (10:34):
What I like about photographs is that they're
wormholes into history.
Hans Buetow (10:40):
This is the director Errol Morris, and he's
doing an interview about hisincredible book, believing is
seeing, which is all about theidea of truth and photography.
Errol Morris (10:49):
What if I could walk into the picture itself,
look around, and ask myself,what am I really looking at?
What is really there? What isthe reality that this photograph
is in part recording? It's themystery of what we're looking
at. The mystery of what is it.
Hans Buetow (11:09):
His is a very human inclination, one that has fueled
archaeology, genealogy, history,all kinds of science, like the
team who scanned the larynx of a3,000 year old mummy so that
they could synthesize its voice,and the team that hooked up an
air compressor to the splayedopen respiratory system of a
dead lion so they could get itto roar again. Yes. This desire
(11:39):
gives us this sense ofconnection, especially to those
we can never meet.
Errol Morris (11:44):
As if somehow we can actually reach out and touch
the past. Right. It seems soclose, particularly when it's a
photograph of someone that wehave known in life or that is
deeply connected to us, as ifsomehow time really has been
(12:04):
defeated, which is one of thegreat dreams. Look, we can
defeat time.
Hans Buetow (12:13):
This desire makes deep sense to me and feels
different from what's happeningwith the animations that I'm
seeing when I'm sitting in thecity council meeting, which
those feel more risky. But why?Why is that? In Tori's story,
making a new photo of her deadmom herself, that feels like one
(12:37):
thing. Lowercase h history.
But in this room, these photosare of and for our town, and
they feel like they belong toall of us. They're shared
uppercase h history. If we startmessing with our uppercase h
history, I think that feels verydifferent, especially when we're
(12:57):
using the hand of AI to do it.After the city council meeting,
I was talking about this with mywife saying, I should probably
try out animating some photos tosee what it's like. She
countered with a strong no.
(13:18):
There are just certain thingsthat should not exist, she said.
This isn't a practical issueabout could we. This is a moral
issue about should we. I startedthinking then about photos that
I don't want AI to try to bringto life. Like what would the
computer imagine comes afterRobert Capa's nineteen thirty
(13:39):
six photo, the one of a Spanishsoldier whose mid collapse after
being shot in the head?
Or the 1930 photo by LawrenceBeitler of the lynching of
Thomas Ship and Abram Smith withtheir killers looking on
smiling. I feel like I know whatAI would do with those grins,
those bodies. Photo after photostarted springing to mind of
(14:01):
things that are shared,important images that document a
piece of our collective history.Over the next couple of weeks, I
started thinking about thistechnology and the photo that
has burrowed its way most intomy memory. This photo is
gruesome or it's about to begruesome.
Don Carlton (14:21):
Well, this photograph, which has many
names, by the way, over theyears, know, but it's been
generally called the SaigonExecution.
Hans Buetow (14:30):
This is doctor Don Carlton. Don helped acquire the
estate of Eddie Adams who diedin 02/2004. Eddie was the
Associated Press photographerwho took the photo, the Saigon
execution, and it's one you'veprobably seen. Two men in a
street, one with a gun to thehead of the other. So Don
(14:51):
specializes in the history ofnews media and the use of
historical photographs, and Iasked him to tell me the story
of this photo.
And in case you hadn't gatheredwith a title like the Saigon
Execution, this is gonna beabout an execution. So if that's
not what you wanna hear about,just skip ahead about three and
a half minutes. Okay. Here wego.
Don Carlton (15:13):
He took the photograph during the Tet
Offensive, and the Vietnam War,which was in February of
nineteen sixty eight.
Hans Buetow (15:21):
Eddie Adams was out scouting a story of a nearby
skirmish between police,soldiers, and Viet Cong.
Eddie Adams (15:27):
Xolon is a Chinese section of Saigon.
Hans Buetow (15:30):
This is Eddie in an interview with the AP prior to
his death.
Eddie Adams (15:33):
And we got within a couple of blocks of the area. It
was very quiet. There wasn't anythere's no movement. When
there's no movement, no people,you know that something is up.
Don Carlton (15:45):
He saw when he was going to his car, he happened to
look over and see members of thenational police there, the South
Vietnamese national police,leading this accused terrorist
just down the middle of thestreet. Gunfire was going all
over the place, so there wasn'tmuch traffic. Okay?
Eddie Adams (16:01):
And they just kept walking up maybe about a hundred
yards to the corner.
Don Carlton (16:07):
This man, who was unidentified at the time, had
his hands tied behind his back.
Eddie Adams (16:13):
And they stopped for a minute. I was about five
feet away from the prisoner.
Don Carlton (16:19):
And the police told him that the man in their
custody was a Viet Cong. He hadkilled a police officer, one of
their fellow, you know, one oftheir colleagues in the police
department. So there was a lotof anger.
Eddie Adams (16:32):
To my left came this guy, I had no idea.
Don Carlton (16:36):
General Lone, he was their boss, walked up to the
group and he reached for hispistol.
Eddie Adams (16:42):
He went over and I seen him go for his pistol.
Don Carlton (16:44):
Eddie was standing there with his camera.
Eddie Adams (16:47):
It had a 35 millimeter lens and a single
frame camera.
Don Carlton (16:50):
He had just zero idea about what Long was going
to do.
Eddie Adams (16:55):
Well, when somebody goes for their pistol, they
normally threaten. But I'vetaken pictures like that.
Somebody threatening somebody,you know, do this or I'm gonna
shoot you, and nothing everhappens. So I seen him go for
his pistol. As soon as he raisedhis pistol, I took one frame.
Don Carlton (17:08):
At the moment, literally, that Lone fired the
shot
Eddie Adams (17:13):
That was the incident that he shot him.
Don Carlton (17:15):
Into the alleged terrorist's right temple, almost
point blank.
Eddie Adams (17:20):
And I didn't I had no idea that he was gonna do
this.
Hans Buetow (17:25):
The photo shows the two men with general loan in
military fatigues casuallylooking down his outstretched
arm to a revolver that's in hishand, and that gun is maybe a
few inches away from the head ofWindvom Lem, who's a captain for
the Vietcong. Lem is dressed ina plaid shirt. He's got his arms
behind his back, and he'sleaning a little bit away from
(17:45):
the general with his body, Andhe has his eyes closed, and he's
just forming an expression ofsurprise.
Eddie Adams (17:51):
According to the US army, they said the bullet was
still in his head when thepicture was taken.
Hans Buetow (17:59):
I think for me, part of the power that has
always been in that and thereason I think about that photo
is because it's the moment rightbefore you know what's gonna
happen and you get to live inthis world where it doesn't
happen even though you know ithas to happen.
Don Carlton (18:15):
It's also the millisecond when that man is
still alive probably. If thebullet is in his head, he is
probably still alive. That's hislast millisecond.
Hans Buetow (18:26):
I think there's so much power in that.
Don Carlton (18:29):
Well, it's a it is an incredibly powerful
photograph.
Eddie Adams (18:39):
This
Hans Buetow (18:39):
photograph makes me feel more things than almost any
other photograph in the world. Ifind it challenging actually to
look at. It makes my heart hurtfor both of these men, for the
world that they had to survivein, and for that moment that
brought them together. When Ilook at this, I stare at Lon's
outstretched arm that's holdingthe gun and it feels to me like
(19:04):
there's this ray of energythat's between him and his
victim that's connecting themforever. It feels immediate and
eternal.
But it's not beautiful.
Eddie Adams (19:31):
There's not a great work of art in terms of
photography. Number one, it's awrong time of day. The light
wasn't right. The composition,it was terrible. But on the
other hand, that was a momentthat was, I guess, very
important.
And I still don't believe, youknow, I I still don't understand
to this day why it was soimportant because I've heard so
(19:52):
many different versions of whatthis picture did, like it helped
end the war in Vietnam.
Hans Buetow (19:58):
The day after it was taken, the photograph
appeared on front pages ofnewspapers all around the world.
Don Carlton (20:03):
I remember vividly when I first saw that
photograph. Houston Post andHouston Chronicle, both of them
featured prominently. And sowhen I saw it, I was shocked.
God, here is confirmation of theatrocities that are being waged
in this country. It was arepulsion.
Hans Buetow (20:26):
This repulsion was broadly shared. The Saigon
execution is considered apowerful force in changing
public opinion about the VietnamWar. Eddie Adams won the
Pulitzer Prize, and the act andthe people captured in it
changed the world. They changedhistory. I asked Don about the
(20:47):
AI animating technology, andthat was really the reason that
I wanted to talk to him in thefirst place.
I wanted to know his views on itbecause of how complicated mine
were. I went looking for someservices that do this, and I
found there's there's a few ofthem, that are out there. And I
found one that has differentsettings that you can put on it.
(21:11):
And one of the settings is youcan, have two people in the
photograph hug. And I thought,what if I put Eddie Adams' photo
in to that algorithm, andinstead of shooting him in the
(21:31):
head, the two men hug.
So if you can imagine that,right? Like I feed it in AI,
like how would that change themeaning of the photograph?
Don Carlton (21:42):
Well, totally, mean, it's not reality any
longer. It's not what thephotograph, the original
photograph depicted. So it's atotally new, it's a whole new
image that lacks any kind ofrealism to it because it's been
altered pretty profoundly whenyou do something like that. And
it's just AI in the way thatyou're talking about is going to
(22:06):
change that photograph. It's notgoing be the same photograph.
Hans Buetow (22:12):
AI animating services let you do all kinds of
things. You can make people hugor French kiss or just wave and
smile. But I haven't done any ofthose things to any photo, let
alone the Saigon executionbecause both I don't want to and
because, frankly, I don't haveto. There is video of that
(22:36):
moment because standing next toEddie Adams that day was a news
camera person. Don't go watchthe video if you haven't
already.
It's an execution. It'sdisturbing, but both Don and I
have watched it, and it feels sodifferent from Eddie Adams'
photo.
Don Carlton (22:54):
I would argue probably very few people have
seen the film, and if they have,very few remember much about it,
because it's up and gone in aflash.
Hans Buetow (23:06):
A lot of the iconic capital h history photos have
accompanying moving images. Theflag raising in Iwo Jima, the
Hindenburg crash, the liberationfrom the concentration camps.
Don Carlton (23:17):
The napalm girl.
Hans Buetow (23:18):
Napalm girl. Yeah. Which interestingly was also
filmed.
Don Carlton (23:21):
Yes. That's true.
Hans Buetow (23:23):
Yeah. But like that photo and Eddie's photo, like
have a life that those filmsdon't and never will.
Don Carlton (23:30):
No. No. No. No way. No way.
I mean, you can't use a sitthere and look at the horror on
those kids faces. You're notgonna see those faces the same
way in a motion picture. It's sofast. I mean, it just but it
lets you sit there and stareinto the face of this horror,
and think about it. You can't dothat with a film.
Hans Buetow (23:58):
There's something in the gap between still and
moving images that's helping meto start to understand what
feels so unsettling about thoseAI images that I first saw in
that city council meeting. Stilland moving, they're not
interchangeable, and they affectus differently. They hold
different power, differentpotential, even different
(24:19):
truths. Since we created movingimages in the nineteenth
century, we have always onlybeen able to bridge that gap in
one direction. We take a stillshot from the moving, but AI is
now letting us cross that chasmthe other way.
After the break, we're goinglook at that chasm between a
(24:42):
still and a moving image and howbad we are at seeing what's at
the bottom.
Call In (24:56):
Hey. Hi, Hans.
Hello. This is Kevin Myers. I ama video producer in the Twin
Cities.
It was interesting to get yourquestion about how do I see the
difference between a still imageand a moving image.
The difference between a stillimage and a moving image.
A still image and a movingimage.
(25:18):
I have been thinking about thedifference between a still image
and a moving image a lot.
Hans Buetow (25:26):
To answer that for myself, I wanted to start by
getting a compass from myfamily, my friends, my friends
of friends.
Call In (25:36):
A still image is like an individual.
It is an old man stooping topick up his hat.
The inhale. And a moving imageis like a family.
It unfolds like a river.
It's the exhale.
Hans Buetow (25:52):
In some ways, scrutinizing difference between
a still and a moving image is apurely philosophical question.
But in other ways, it's deeplypractical. So let's start there,
practically, and then work ourway back to the philosophy of
it.
Call In (26:07):
I associate moving images with sharing a narrative
and still images with needing toinvent a narrative myself. I can
add my imagination to it.They're all kind of imagination,
all possibility. They can beinterpreted in a million
different ways.
Hans Buetow (26:27):
Science backs this up. Motion tells our brains
what's important to look at. Inour animal brain, motion is much
more likely to be dangerous. Ithijacks our attention. It means
that when there's motion in amovie, everyone's eyes are
following along.
A dozen people looking at thesame thing altogether. Still
(26:49):
images, they don't tell us whereto look so explicitly, at least
not on that, like, animal level.So a dozen people looking at a
painting are all gonna tracedifferent paths with their eyes.
They will fixate less in anyindividual spot and they'll
shift around more. Thesynchronicity of moving images
has an impact.
(27:10):
A 2010 study of people watchingmovies in MRI machines showed
that along with joining up oureye movements, moving images
also synchronize our emotionalresponses to those images.
Everyone in the theater gaspsall at once. No one in the
portrait gallery gasps at thesame time, or even sometimes at
(27:34):
all. We generally experiencestill images as objects of
interpretation and exploration,and moving images as places for
emotion and engagement.
Call In (27:49):
Sure. Minimal motion blur, but a 20 FPS is still 120
still images, one after thenext. I think of all images as
still, that the word imageimplies stillness.
Hans Buetow (28:06):
These perceptions of both still and moving images
all hinge on our ability to movethrough time.
John Berger (28:14):
The most important thing about paintings themselves
is that their images are silentstill.
Hans Buetow (28:23):
That is John Berger, a legendary theorist
about images, art, reproduction,the observer, and time. Yes.
Moving images are a bunch ofstill images over time. It's all
an illusion. The movement ismanufactured as the still images
collect over time into motion.
(28:45):
But the relationship betweenimages and time is much more
complicated than just that.Here's Berger from his 1972 BBC
special, Ways of Seeing.
John Berger (28:54):
It's as if the painting, absolutely still,
soundless, becomes a corridorconnecting the moment it
represents with a moment atwhich you are looking at it. And
something travels down thatcorridor at a speed greater than
light, throwing into questionour way of measuring time
(29:16):
itself.
Hans Buetow (29:17):
Berger's corridor brings us into connection
through time across time. Itnarrows, it collapses, or it
freezes. As Laura Mulvey says inher book, Death 24 Times a
Second, quote, just as thecinema animates its still
frames, so it brings back tolife in perfect fossil form
(29:39):
anyone it has ever recorded,from great star to fleeting
extra. It brings back to life.Back.
Necromancy. Wicked, thrilling,and tied to our dialogue with
death. Which brings us back toAI. AI to me does not feel like
(30:03):
necromancy. AI is creating amonster from scraps of reality.
A version of something that werecognize but really only
sideways that is animated bysupernatural black box forces
that can give form to darkshapeless substances but cannot
(30:24):
bring into being the substanceitself. Man, how ignorant art
thou in thy pride of wisdom. Wethink we can harness the
monster, control it, maketrivial its consequences as we
channel lightning throughstitches and flesh electrifying
(30:46):
the slab that holds a hulkingbehemoth. We think it will do
our bidding with no reason tohave a life of its own. We have
fed our loved ones into the gutsof a machine so that we can
watch them dance.
Call In (31:13):
Still images, I I feel like have stood the test of time
more so maybe because they'vebeen around longer. It can be
more iconic. I think it is muchharder to have an iconic moving
image.
Hans Buetow (31:25):
Time is also built up as provenance. When we stand
in front of an originalpainting, we marvel at the
content and the craft, but alsoa physical presence. Seeing
where the artist's brush leftthe canvas and knowing that your
eyes and their eyes have seenthe same atoms. As John Berger
(31:47):
says, we believe in the powerand value of the original, the
genuine, the verifiable, as anearly religious object, not
because of what it shows us, butsimply because it has survived
long enough to show it to us.Saigon execution feels like that
(32:11):
and an AI animation of an imagefeels to me the opposite of
that.
It doesn't feel transportative,but strangely static. It doesn't
feel connected, but rerouted,tangential. John Berger's
corridor in an AI animation onlyruns for a moment before it hits
(32:32):
the black box of ones and zeros.
Call In (32:40):
I'm not sure why, but the first image that came to
mind is one that my grandfathertook back in 1912. And the photo
is of my grandmother standingclose-up in a field of corn
contemplating a corn cob. And Iget to put myself kind of in
(33:03):
place of my grandfather and howdid he see her in that moment.
We, I think, images. It still, Ithink, says more about the
person taking the image thanabout the image itself.
Hans Buetow (33:26):
All images are subject to perspective. They are
not moments themselves, butwindows into them.
Errol Morris (33:34):
Images, by their very nature, they they rip a
piece out of the fabric ofreality. They they take a swatch
out of reality. And in doing so,you you don't get to see above
and below. You don't get to seeleft and right. You just get to
(33:58):
see what's in the frame.
Hans Buetow (34:00):
Errol Morris likes to speculate about the elephant
that's just outside the frame,the one that the photographer
chose not to include in theirpicture of their Florida
vacation. Someone said, movethat elephant out of the way,
and then snapped the photo ortook the video. Either way,
because of the possible elephantoutside of every frame, we are
(34:21):
left only with the choices madeby the framer.
John Berger (34:25):
Paintings lend themselves to easy manipulation.
They can be used to makearguments or points which may be
different, very different fromtheir original meaning. And
because paintings areessentially silent and still,
The most obvious way ofmanipulating them is by using
movement and sound.
Hans Buetow (34:47):
John Berger here is talking about putting paintings
on TV. So zooming in on certainelements that will guide and
focus the audience with a newframe. Same thing with AI. By
animating a still image, you cancompletely change the frame. You
can pan right.
You can pan left. You can havethe camera move down the street.
You can theoretically reveal theelephant. But what if there was
(35:10):
no elephant to be revealed?
Call In (35:15):
There's more information in a moving image
for sure. There's just morecontext.
Hans Buetow (35:25):
Beyond the frame is everything else.
John Berger (35:28):
The meaning of an image can be changed according
to what you see beside it orwhat comes after it.
Hans Buetow (35:35):
An old photo is always instantly recognizable as
an old photo. In looking at alot of AI animations, however,
as soon as they start to movewith their perfect frame rates,
their smooth skin, their eerilydigital modernity, It puts the
old into a contemporary visuallanguage. The antiquated and
(35:58):
distant becomes relatable andimmediate. If you put it into
your feed, it wouldn't reallystand out as an old photo. It
would be imbued with the essenceof a TikTok.
But really, it would become lessjarring to put next to a TikTok.
And when it's more comfortableto ingest, it becomes easier to
(36:21):
digest.
John Berger (36:21):
What it means, in theory, is that reproduction of
works of art can be used byanybody for their own purposes.
Images can be used like words,we can talk with them.
Reproduction should make iteasier to connect our experience
of art directly with otherexperiences.
Hans Buetow (36:40):
We take them out of context, they start to say
something new, which can begood, even great sometimes. But
some swords have two edges.
Call In (37:04):
A still image is, more easily controllable, more easy
to hide the truth, actually.
Hans Buetow (37:14):
Are AI generated moving images a lie? Sure. But
so are moving images for all thereasons we've discussed framing,
intention, time. And so are allphotographs. All of them tell a
limited version of what there isto know.
They are all lies. Or are they?Here's Errol Morris again.
Errol Morris (37:38):
Well, don't believe that photographs are
either true or false. Never hasmade any sense to me. True seems
to be linguistic about arelationship of language to the
world, not of a photograph tothe world. Also, I believe all
(38:00):
photographs are posed. So ifsomeone tells me that one
photograph is more truthful thananother because it was or wasn't
posed, I think that's very veryclose to nonsense talk.
Hans Buetow (38:19):
This is a complicated conversation. There
are many smart people who havewritten and said many things
about this. But for ourpurposes, I don't think the
truth inherent in either movingor still images really matters
that much. I think about it sortof like Errol does. Like, I
think about one of my favoriteTV shows, the reality show Love
(38:41):
Island.
Situation is ridiculous, but theemotions are real.
Call In (38:49):
Yeah. There's all sorts of things to think about it.
Anyway
Anyways. I think that's all Igot for you right now.
Those are my thoughts. Hope thathelps.
Thanks again for reaching out.See you soon. Bye bye. Bye.
Hans Buetow (39:06):
So why does all this matter? The way we
perceive, the way we think abouttime, the truth inherent in
images, the emotions that theyevoke. Why do we care? Well,
it's because the emotions arereal. On 11/13/2021, at a
(39:33):
stoplight in Arizona, a mannamed Chris Pelkey was shot and
killed by another man in a roadrage incident.
After a three and a half yeartrial, the man who shot and
killed him, Gabriel Horcasidis,was convicted of manslaughter.
As first reported by four zerofour Media, this trial marked
(39:53):
the first time that testimonyfrom a murder victim was given
at his killer's sentencing, andit was accomplished using AI.
Pellke's sister wrote some copyand created an avatar that
looked and spoke like her deadbrother.
Christopher Pelkey Avatar: Picture and my voice profile. (40:17):
undefined
Hans Buetow (40:19):
There's a brief video of Pelkey, who's an army
veteran, that they used to makethe avatar, and then it cuts
back to the avatar who haltinglythanks the judge for all his
hard work. He says hisappreciation for everyone who
testified on his behalf, andthen he addresses his killer
directly.
Christopher Pelkey Avatar (40:36):
So I would like to make my own impact
statement to Gabriel Horkasidas,the man who shot me. It is a
shame we encountered each otherthat day in those circumstances.
In another life, we probablycould have been friends. I
believe in forgiveness and inGod who forgives. I always have,
and I still do.
Hans Buetow (40:58):
He's not really moving much. Just his mouth is
slightly animated. The audio isclipped at the end of every
sentence with clear AIartifacts, weird inflections,
multiple breaths, strangephrasing, and all of it was
written by his sister. This isweird enough to begin with. And
then I listened to what thejudge, Todd Lang, had to say
(41:21):
about it.
Judge Lang (41:25):
I love that AI. Thank you for that. And as angry
as you are and justifiably angryas the family is, I heard the
forgiveness, and I know misterHortacitas appreciate it, but so
did I. As I said, I like tothink I would do that. I don't
(41:46):
know that I would.
But I love the beauty in whatChristopher and I call him
Christopher. I always callpeople by their last names. It's
a formality of the court, but Ifeel like calling him
Christopher as we've gotten toknow him today. I feel that that
was genuine, that his obviousforgiveness of mister Jorge
(42:07):
Cicitas reflects the character Iheard about today. But it also
says something about the familybecause you told me how angry
you were, and you demanded themaximum sentence.
And even though that's what youwanted, you allowed Chris to
speak from his heart as you sawit. I didn't hear him asking for
(42:30):
the maximum sentence.
Hans Buetow (42:33):
Respectfully, your honor. No. You didn't. You
didn't hear it because he neversaid it because he's dead. What
you heard, everything that youheard, judge Lang, was the words
of his sister run through amachine, a sister who told four
(42:53):
zero four media in an interviewthat quote, our goal was to make
the judge cry.
Our goal was to bring Chris tolife and humanize him. Judge
Lang knows that this was AIgenerated, but you can hear over
the course of his comments howmuch he anthropomorphizes the
(43:13):
simulation. He calls itChristopher. He begins talking
about the victim in the presenttense. This has affected him.
Pelkey's sister accomplished hergoal. So the prosecution had
been asking for a sentence ofnine years. And then following
the testimony that he knewwasn't real, judge Lang gave
(43:36):
Gabriel Horkasidis the maximumsentence of ten and a half years
in prison. This isn't a personaldecision. Do I make an AI model
of my dead brother?
This is a societal question.Where? How? And how much of this
do we tolerate? I don't knowwhere to draw that line.
(44:00):
But one thing this makesabsolutely clear to me is that
even people whose job it is tosoundly, dispassionately, and
accurately evaluate and judgethings seem to be confused.
Maybe this is making a mountainout of a molehill. This is just
one person, after all. But thisis person in a position of
(44:21):
power, who has now set aprecedent. And this is not not
worrying.
I'm not not worried.
Judge Lang (44:39):
I'm not
Jeff Ongstad (44:39):
really sure why it's doing that.
Hans Buetow (44:41):
So there I am look too close. In this council
meeting this past March,watching example after example
of AI animating still imagesturning into videos.
Jeff Ongstad (44:48):
But it is kind of amazing how it can take these
and have all these kids move anddo stuff and we're this kid
keeps changing to differentpeople.
Hans Buetow (44:56):
I'm tempted by it.
Jeff Ongstad (44:58):
But it can look at something
Hans Buetow (44:59):
I'm repulsed by it. I feel like I can hold both of
those at once.
Jeff Ongstad (45:05):
And like if you looked at this kind of stuff,
probably like even six monthsago, was nowhere near this and I
figure in the next six monthsit'll progress even more. And I
know
Hans Buetow (45:15):
But I'm thinking, what do we think we're learning
from this? As media consumers,how much do we understand about
the power we're witnessing orwielding ourselves? I'm not sure
what lesson we're taking or moreprobably not taking.
Jeff Ongstad (45:31):
Something
Hans Buetow (45:33):
is happening. I'm not sure what, but we can see
that it's already having animpact.
Jeff Ongstad (45:40):
Do you have any questions I'd be happy to
answer?
City Council Member (45:45):
Questions from counsel? Jeff, thank you
very much.
Jeff Ongstad (45:49):
Thank you. And I can leave support we have.
City Council Member (45:52):
And yeah. This is great. And
Jeff Ongstad (45:55):
I'll use it I'll use my power wisely from now.
Thank you very much.
City Council Member (46:01):
Thank you. Appreciate you taking the time
to come out and give us theannual report.
Hans Buetow (46:23):
Huge, huge thank you to Doctor. Don Carlton for
talking to me for this segment.You can learn more about the
Eddie Adams collection and thewhole of the Dolph Briscoe
Center, it's very cool, atbriscoecenter.org. Thank you
also to Amy, Kevin, Kristen,Munna, Seth, Martha, Dana,
(46:45):
Eddie, James, and everyone elsewho submitted their thoughts and
recordings about the differencebetween a still and a moving
image. I am interested in whatyou think that difference is and
whether or not you would animateany of your family photos or any
other photos.
Please let me know. Get in touchat 651615507, drop us a line at
(47:10):
our website, or email us at theneverpost@gmail.com. I wanna
know how you feel about all ofit. All that in the show notes.
Mike Rugnetta (48:20):
That is the show we have for you this week. We're
gonna be back here in the mainfeed on Wednesday, June 18. In
(48:40):
2019, Rove Concepts, a furnituremanufacturer, surveyed 2,000
American households and foundthat the average couch contained
$1.55 in change. That is nearlyhalfway to a monthly Neverpost
membership. Go check the car.
Maybe that winter coat you putaway a couple months ago. The
(49:02):
chair by the window. The onethat you love to read in. That
has gotta have at least 30¢ init. What I'm saying here is that
there is $4 just laying aroundyour house that you're not even
using and we will.
We'll use it to pay our hostingcosts. We'll use it to pay
contributing producers. We'llput it towards our research
(49:24):
budget and more. Never poe dot st to become a member. $4 a
month.
That's just over two and a halfcouches worth of change. Never
post producers are Audrey Evans,Georgia Hampton, and the
mysterious. Doctor first name,last name. Our senior producer
(49:44):
is Hans Buto. Our executiveproducer is Jason Oberholzer,
and the show's host, that's me,is Mike Rignetta.
Moving, variant ornithography ofthose uninitiated made into
memory by the me brieflyincarnate. Full of myself on
(50:06):
successive nights dense andalone sings you back. Need keeps
the book of dying open, thelanguage common after all.
Relieved, the task finallychanging prompts, tapping my
reserve feeling now wise to itsedge. Where are you risk any
detail of what's in me havingbeen tricked by that image of
(50:30):
man?
Excerpt of Fourth Fourth by GilOtt. Never Post is a production
of Charts and Leisure and isdistributed by Radiotopia.
Friends, hello, and welcome to Never Post, a
podcast for and about theInternet. I'm your host, Mike
Rugnetta. This intro was writtenon Tuesday, 06/03/2025 at
08:27AM eastern, and we have aconsidered show for you this
week. In our second ever episodelength segment, Hans confronts
(00:31):
the technological, moral, andphilosophical impacts of using
artificial intelligence toanimate still photos, including
those of both personal andhistorical significance. It's an
incredible, and as you've cometo expect from Hans, incredibly
thoughtful piece, and I'm veryexcited for you to hear it.
(00:54):
And also pet sounds. But rightnow, we're gonna take a quick
break. You're gonna listen tosome ads unless you're on the
member feed. And when we return,we're gonna talk about a few of
the things that have happenedsince the last time you heard
from us. Hold on to your butts.
I've got five stories for youthis week. Academics left
(01:15):
Twitter for Blue Sky along witha lot of other people, but a new
study out of Zurich and The UKlooks at academics specifically
asking why did those whoswitched make the switch. The
researchers call Blue Sky a,quote, rare natural experiment
for studying large scalemigration from a long stable
(01:36):
platform, end quote, and findthat, quote, the transition
behavior of accounts a userfollows, followees, exerts
substantially stronger influencethan the behavior of their
followers. In other words,academics and maybe people in
general, but who knows, followinformation sources over access
(01:58):
to audiences when deciding toswitch platforms. Researchers
also found that shock events, asthey call them, account for huge
bumps in transition from oneplatform to another.
These are things like xinstituting fees, the public
launch of Blue Sky when invitecodes were no longer needed,
Brazil blocking x, and thebiggest by far, the result of
(02:22):
the most recent US election.Speaking of x, CommunityNotes'
most prolific contributor is acybersecurity startup. According
to Web three Antivirus founderAlex Dulube, the company
apparently uses a combination ofmachine learning and automation
tools to provide additionalcontext in the community notes
(02:44):
section of x posts that forwardcrypto scams, which scam sniffer
estimates cost x users nearly$47,000,000 in March of this
year. Nancy Mace, the toiletsobsessed Republican
congresswoman from SouthCarolina has apparently
commanded bot armies as well asher own staffers at the helm of
(03:09):
burners and sock puppets tocounter criticism of her online.
This according to Wired.
We had to make multipleaccounts, burner accounts, and
go and reply to comments sayingthat things weren't true even on
Reddit forums, a former staffertold Wired. We were
congressional staff and therewere actual things we could be
(03:32):
doing to help the constituents.Mace, the staffers report,
describes herself as a selftaught coder. RFK junior, the
brainworm having ist cabinethead secretary of the department
of health and human services,oversees the CDC, FDA, and so on
released his make our childrenhealthy again report as part of
(03:54):
his so called make Americahealthy again commission, and it
contains citations for researchwhich does not exist, likely
hallucinated by an LLM used togenerate the report. According
to NODIS, at least seven of thestudies cited in the report do
not exist, leading researchscientists cited to clarify that
(04:15):
the work attributed to them isnot real.
Other nonexistent studies areattributed to nonexistent
authors. And finally, Robloxgrow a garden game hit 8,700,000
concurrent users at the end oflast month. The game is a kind
of farming sim reminiscent ofAnimal Crossing in that the
(04:37):
landscape persists and changeswhile the player is away. Grow a
garden offers in game purchasesfor resources useful in the
tending of the farm, whichBloomberg reports have made
their way off platform, sellingfor inflated prices at various
digital goods marketplaces.Players of the game, which
accounts for nearly 30% ofRoblox total activity at the
(05:00):
moment, spend millions ofdollars a week buying secondhand
digital items according tomarketplace site Eldorado.GG
founder, Vladis Jorkevicius.
According to Roblox terms ofservice, however, this is not
allowed. The company has yet tostep in. That is the news I have
(05:22):
for you this week in this week'sepisode, Hans, on using
artificial intelligence toanimate the past and the
feelings that inspires. Butfirst, in our interstitials this
week, pet sounds.
Hans Buetow (05:36):
Literally. Quick notice that this segment
(06:29):
contains discussions of war,execution, and murder.
City Council Member (06:43):
Alright. Good evening and welcome to the
City of Falcon Heights CityCouncil meeting on Wednesday,
03/26/2025. We'll call thismeeting to order at 07:03PM.
Hans Buetow (06:57):
Just a couple of months ago, my wife and I
attended our first ever citycouncil meeting for our small
town. We were there along withabout probably 80 other citizens
because on the agenda that nightwas the debate on public versus
paid street parking for theMinnesota State Fair. And unlike
(07:17):
most of the food at the fair, itwas a pretty spicy night, which
started with the head of ourlocal public access TV, Jeff
Ongstad, doing an annual report.
Jeff Ongstad (07:27):
I had no idea there was this much interest in
community television. In 2025and beyond, we anticipate
another 25% increase in allcommunity coverage long form and
short form.
Hans Buetow (07:41):
I love community services like this. So I was
pretty stoked to hear aboutcovering local high school
sports and doing video for citycouncil meetings.
Jeff Ongstad (07:50):
We're also having a larger presence at community
events. So if you have eventswhere we can have a table or a
tent or something, we'd like tobe there, show some of our
stuff. We're buying a TV thatyou can play outside. So we're
excited about that.
Hans Buetow (08:04):
And then towards the end of his presentation,
things suddenly changed.
Jeff Ongstad (08:09):
And I'd like to show you just a little example.
We're embracing AI assistedproduction to enhance
capabilities we have along withspeeding up our workflow.
Hans Buetow (08:15):
Let's just pause here real quick. I want to
explain what I'm looking at inthis moment. On the screen
behind Jeff Ongstad is aphotograph that he's showing of
a group of three adult men and adozen boys who look probably, I
don't know, 10 years old.They're all in a parking lot.
You can see the tail fin of anineteen fifties car off to the
(08:36):
right.
The boys are looking in everydirection, mostly at each other.
A few of them are looking at thecamera, and, of course, one kid
in the back is blowing araspberry.
Jeff Ongstad (08:44):
Just one area that we're using is is like in old
photographs and stuff to animatethose.
Hans Buetow (08:50):
As he says this
Jeff Ongstad (08:51):
So we can take old photos like this and not only
clean them up, but then bringthem to life.
Hans Buetow (08:56):
Everyone in the picture starts to move.
Jeff Ongstad (08:59):
And that's just from an old photograph.
Hans Buetow (09:01):
Like, literally, they all just start looking at
each other. Most start smiling.A few of them, like, mouth words
to each other. One kid bendsdown. The other kids all look at
him while he does that.
Even the trees in the backgroundstart to blow lightly in the
breezes. My first thought, thisis cool. Followed by a strong
(09:23):
desire to do this with photos ofmy family, I am my generation's
keeper of the family history andobject. So I have boxes, photos
going back several generations,which I've cataloged, I've
digitized, and I could put intoAI a photo of my great
grandfather who I'm named after,but who died before I was born.
(09:45):
And this man who I never metwould smile at me.
And I immediately think of ourfriend contributing producer
Tori Dominguez Peek, who lastyear filed a story for us about
(10:07):
companies who are trying to gether to make AI representations
of her dead mom for Mother'sDay. And Tori's piece focused on
what feels like to reanimateyour dead family members with
AI. And even though she'sconfident that she doesn't want
to do that, she doesn't want tobuild an AI version of her mom,
I'm not so sure.
Errol Morris (10:34):
What I like about photographs is that they're
wormholes into history.
Hans Buetow (10:40):
This is the director Errol Morris, and he's
doing an interview about hisincredible book, believing is
seeing, which is all about theidea of truth and photography.
Errol Morris (10:49):
What if I could walk into the picture itself,
look around, and ask myself,what am I really looking at?
What is really there? What isthe reality that this photograph
is in part recording? It's themystery of what we're looking
at. The mystery of what is it.
Hans Buetow (11:09):
His is a very human inclination, one that has fueled
archaeology, genealogy, history,all kinds of science, like the
team who scanned the larynx of a3,000 year old mummy so that
they could synthesize its voice,and the team that hooked up an
air compressor to the splayedopen respiratory system of a
dead lion so they could get itto roar again. Yes. This desire
(11:39):
gives us this sense ofconnection, especially to those
we can never meet.
Errol Morris (11:44):
As if somehow we can actually reach out and touch
the past. Right. It seems soclose, particularly when it's a
photograph of someone that wehave known in life or that is
deeply connected to us, as ifsomehow time really has been
(12:04):
defeated, which is one of thegreat dreams. Look, we can
defeat time.
Hans Buetow (12:13):
This desire makes deep sense to me and feels
different from what's happeningwith the animations that I'm
seeing when I'm sitting in thecity council meeting, which
those feel more risky. But why?Why is that? In Tori's story,
making a new photo of her deadmom herself, that feels like one
(12:37):
thing. Lowercase h history.
But in this room, these photosare of and for our town, and
they feel like they belong toall of us. They're shared
uppercase h history. If we startmessing with our uppercase h
history, I think that feels verydifferent, especially when we're
(12:57):
using the hand of AI to do it.After the city council meeting,
I was talking about this with mywife saying, I should probably
try out animating some photos tosee what it's like. She
countered with a strong no.
(13:18):
There are just certain thingsthat should not exist, she said.
This isn't a practical issueabout could we. This is a moral
issue about should we. I startedthinking then about photos that
I don't want AI to try to bringto life. Like what would the
computer imagine comes afterRobert Capa's nineteen thirty
(13:39):
six photo, the one of a Spanishsoldier whose mid collapse after
being shot in the head?
Or the 1930 photo by LawrenceBeitler of the lynching of
Thomas Ship and Abram Smith withtheir killers looking on
smiling. I feel like I know whatAI would do with those grins,
those bodies. Photo after photostarted springing to mind of
(14:01):
things that are shared,important images that document a
piece of our collective history.Over the next couple of weeks, I
started thinking about thistechnology and the photo that
has burrowed its way most intomy memory. This photo is
gruesome or it's about to begruesome.
Don Carlton (14:21):
Well, this photograph, which has many
names, by the way, over theyears, know, but it's been
generally called the SaigonExecution.
Hans Buetow (14:30):
This is doctor Don Carlton. Don helped acquire the
estate of Eddie Adams who diedin 02/2004. Eddie was the
Associated Press photographerwho took the photo, the Saigon
execution, and it's one you'veprobably seen. Two men in a
street, one with a gun to thehead of the other. So Don
(14:51):
specializes in the history ofnews media and the use of
historical photographs, and Iasked him to tell me the story
of this photo.
And in case you hadn't gatheredwith a title like the Saigon
Execution, this is gonna beabout an execution. So if that's
not what you wanna hear about,just skip ahead about three and
a half minutes. Okay. Here wego.
Don Carlton (15:13):
He took the photograph during the Tet
Offensive, and the Vietnam War,which was in February of
nineteen sixty eight.
Hans Buetow (15:21):
Eddie Adams was out scouting a story of a nearby
skirmish between police,soldiers, and Viet Cong.
Eddie Adams (15:27):
Xolon is a Chinese section of Saigon.
Hans Buetow (15:30):
This is Eddie in an interview with the AP prior to
his death.
Eddie Adams (15:33):
And we got within a couple of blocks of the area. It
was very quiet. There wasn't anythere's no movement. When
there's no movement, no people,you know that something is up.
Don Carlton (15:45):
He saw when he was going to his car, he happened to
look over and see members of thenational police there, the South
Vietnamese national police,leading this accused terrorist
just down the middle of thestreet. Gunfire was going all
over the place, so there wasn'tmuch traffic. Okay?
Eddie Adams (16:01):
And they just kept walking up maybe about a hundred
yards to the corner.
Don Carlton (16:07):
This man, who was unidentified at the time, had
his hands tied behind his back.
Eddie Adams (16:13):
And they stopped for a minute. I was about five
feet away from the prisoner.
Don Carlton (16:19):
And the police told him that the man in their
custody was a Viet Cong. He hadkilled a police officer, one of
their fellow, you know, one oftheir colleagues in the police
department. So there was a lotof anger.
Eddie Adams (16:32):
To my left came this guy, I had no idea.
Don Carlton (16:36):
General Lone, he was their boss, walked up to the
group and he reached for hispistol.
Eddie Adams (16:42):
He went over and I seen him go for his pistol.
Don Carlton (16:44):
Eddie was standing there with his camera.
Eddie Adams (16:47):
It had a 35 millimeter lens and a single
frame camera.
Don Carlton (16:50):
He had just zero idea about what Long was going
to do.
Eddie Adams (16:55):
Well, when somebody goes for their pistol, they
normally threaten. But I'vetaken pictures like that.
Somebody threatening somebody,you know, do this or I'm gonna
shoot you, and nothing everhappens. So I seen him go for
his pistol. As soon as he raisedhis pistol, I took one frame.
Don Carlton (17:08):
At the moment, literally, that Lone fired the
shot
Eddie Adams (17:13):
That was the incident that he shot him.
Don Carlton (17:15):
Into the alleged terrorist's right temple, almost
point blank.
Eddie Adams (17:20):
And I didn't I had no idea that he was gonna do
this.
Hans Buetow (17:25):
The photo shows the two men with general loan in
military fatigues casuallylooking down his outstretched
arm to a revolver that's in hishand, and that gun is maybe a
few inches away from the head ofWindvom Lem, who's a captain for
the Vietcong. Lem is dressed ina plaid shirt. He's got his arms
behind his back, and he'sleaning a little bit away from
(17:45):
the general with his body, Andhe has his eyes closed, and he's
just forming an expression ofsurprise.
Eddie Adams (17:51):
According to the US army, they said the bullet was
still in his head when thepicture was taken.
Hans Buetow (17:59):
I think for me, part of the power that has
always been in that and thereason I think about that photo
is because it's the moment rightbefore you know what's gonna
happen and you get to live inthis world where it doesn't
happen even though you know ithas to happen.
Don Carlton (18:15):
It's also the millisecond when that man is
still alive probably. If thebullet is in his head, he is
probably still alive. That's hislast millisecond.
Hans Buetow (18:26):
I think there's so much power in that.
Don Carlton (18:29):
Well, it's a it is an incredibly powerful
photograph.
Eddie Adams (18:39):
This
Hans Buetow (18:39):
photograph makes me feel more things than almost any
other photograph in the world. Ifind it challenging actually to
look at. It makes my heart hurtfor both of these men, for the
world that they had to survivein, and for that moment that
brought them together. When Ilook at this, I stare at Lon's
outstretched arm that's holdingthe gun and it feels to me like
(19:04):
there's this ray of energythat's between him and his
victim that's connecting themforever. It feels immediate and
eternal.
But it's not beautiful.
Eddie Adams (19:31):
There's not a great work of art in terms of
photography. Number one, it's awrong time of day. The light
wasn't right. The composition,it was terrible. But on the
other hand, that was a momentthat was, I guess, very
important.
And I still don't believe, youknow, I I still don't understand
to this day why it was soimportant because I've heard so
(19:52):
many different versions of whatthis picture did, like it helped
end the war in Vietnam.
Hans Buetow (19:58):
The day after it was taken, the photograph
appeared on front pages ofnewspapers all around the world.
Don Carlton (20:03):
I remember vividly when I first saw that
photograph. Houston Post andHouston Chronicle, both of them
featured prominently. And sowhen I saw it, I was shocked.
God, here is confirmation of theatrocities that are being waged
in this country. It was arepulsion.
Hans Buetow (20:26):
This repulsion was broadly shared. The Saigon
execution is considered apowerful force in changing
public opinion about the VietnamWar. Eddie Adams won the
Pulitzer Prize, and the act andthe people captured in it
changed the world. They changedhistory. I asked Don about the
(20:47):
AI animating technology, andthat was really the reason that
I wanted to talk to him in thefirst place.
I wanted to know his views on itbecause of how complicated mine
were. I went looking for someservices that do this, and I
found there's there's a few ofthem, that are out there. And I
found one that has differentsettings that you can put on it.
(21:11):
And one of the settings is youcan, have two people in the
photograph hug. And I thought,what if I put Eddie Adams' photo
in to that algorithm, andinstead of shooting him in the
(21:31):
head, the two men hug.
So if you can imagine that,right? Like I feed it in AI,
like how would that change themeaning of the photograph?
Don Carlton (21:42):
Well, totally, mean, it's not reality any
longer. It's not what thephotograph, the original
photograph depicted. So it's atotally new, it's a whole new
image that lacks any kind ofrealism to it because it's been
altered pretty profoundly whenyou do something like that. And
it's just AI in the way thatyou're talking about is going to
(22:06):
change that photograph. It's notgoing be the same photograph.
Hans Buetow (22:12):
AI animating services let you do all kinds of
things. You can make people hugor French kiss or just wave and
smile. But I haven't done any ofthose things to any photo, let
alone the Saigon executionbecause both I don't want to and
because, frankly, I don't haveto. There is video of that
(22:36):
moment because standing next toEddie Adams that day was a news
camera person. Don't go watchthe video if you haven't
already.
It's an execution. It'sdisturbing, but both Don and I
have watched it, and it feels sodifferent from Eddie Adams'
photo.
Don Carlton (22:54):
I would argue probably very few people have
seen the film, and if they have,very few remember much about it,
because it's up and gone in aflash.
Hans Buetow (23:06):
A lot of the iconic capital h history photos have
accompanying moving images. Theflag raising in Iwo Jima, the
Hindenburg crash, the liberationfrom the concentration camps.
Don Carlton (23:17):
The napalm girl.
Hans Buetow (23:18):
Napalm girl. Yeah. Which interestingly was also
filmed.
Don Carlton (23:21):
Yes. That's true.
Hans Buetow (23:23):
Yeah. But like that photo and Eddie's photo, like
have a life that those filmsdon't and never will.
Don Carlton (23:30):
No. No. No. No way. No way.
I mean, you can't use a sitthere and look at the horror on
those kids faces. You're notgonna see those faces the same
way in a motion picture. It's sofast. I mean, it just but it
lets you sit there and stareinto the face of this horror,
and think about it. You can't dothat with a film.
Hans Buetow (23:58):
There's something in the gap between still and
moving images that's helping meto start to understand what
feels so unsettling about thoseAI images that I first saw in
that city council meeting. Stilland moving, they're not
interchangeable, and they affectus differently. They hold
different power, differentpotential, even different
(24:19):
truths. Since we created movingimages in the nineteenth
century, we have always onlybeen able to bridge that gap in
one direction. We take a stillshot from the moving, but AI is
now letting us cross that chasmthe other way.
After the break, we're goinglook at that chasm between a
(24:42):
still and a moving image and howbad we are at seeing what's at
the bottom.
Call In (24:56):
Hey. Hi, Hans.
Hello. This is Kevin Myers. I ama video producer in the Twin
Cities.
It was interesting to get yourquestion about how do I see the
difference between a still imageand a moving image.
The difference between a stillimage and a moving image.
A still image and a movingimage.
(25:18):
I have been thinking about thedifference between a still image
and a moving image a lot.
Hans Buetow (25:26):
To answer that for myself, I wanted to start by
getting a compass from myfamily, my friends, my friends
of friends.
Call In (25:36):
A still image is like an individual.
It is an old man stooping topick up his hat.
The inhale. And a moving imageis like a family.
It unfolds like a river.
It's the exhale.
Hans Buetow (25:52):
In some ways, scrutinizing difference between
a still and a moving image is apurely philosophical question.
But in other ways, it's deeplypractical. So let's start there,
practically, and then work ourway back to the philosophy of
it.
Call In (26:07):
I associate moving images with sharing a narrative
and still images with needing toinvent a narrative myself. I can
add my imagination to it.They're all kind of imagination,
all possibility. They can beinterpreted in a million
different ways.
Hans Buetow (26:27):
Science backs this up. Motion tells our brains
what's important to look at. Inour animal brain, motion is much
more likely to be dangerous. Ithijacks our attention. It means
that when there's motion in amovie, everyone's eyes are
following along.
A dozen people looking at thesame thing altogether. Still
(26:49):
images, they don't tell us whereto look so explicitly, at least
not on that, like, animal level.So a dozen people looking at a
painting are all gonna tracedifferent paths with their eyes.
They will fixate less in anyindividual spot and they'll
shift around more. Thesynchronicity of moving images
has an impact.
(27:10):
A 2010 study of people watchingmovies in MRI machines showed
that along with joining up oureye movements, moving images
also synchronize our emotionalresponses to those images.
Everyone in the theater gaspsall at once. No one in the
portrait gallery gasps at thesame time, or even sometimes at
(27:34):
all. We generally experiencestill images as objects of
interpretation and exploration,and moving images as places for
emotion and engagement.
Call In (27:49):
Sure. Minimal motion blur, but a 20 FPS is still 120
still images, one after thenext. I think of all images as
still, that the word imageimplies stillness.
Hans Buetow (28:06):
These perceptions of both still and moving images
all hinge on our ability to movethrough time.
John Berger (28:14):
The most important thing about paintings themselves
is that their images are silentstill.
Hans Buetow (28:23):
That is John Berger, a legendary theorist
about images, art, reproduction,the observer, and time. Yes.
Moving images are a bunch ofstill images over time. It's all
an illusion. The movement ismanufactured as the still images
collect over time into motion.
(28:45):
But the relationship betweenimages and time is much more
complicated than just that.Here's Berger from his 1972 BBC
special, Ways of Seeing.
John Berger (28:54):
It's as if the painting, absolutely still,
soundless, becomes a corridorconnecting the moment it
represents with a moment atwhich you are looking at it. And
something travels down thatcorridor at a speed greater than
light, throwing into questionour way of measuring time
(29:16):
itself.
Hans Buetow (29:17):
Berger's corridor brings us into connection
through time across time. Itnarrows, it collapses, or it
freezes. As Laura Mulvey says inher book, Death 24 Times a
Second, quote, just as thecinema animates its still
frames, so it brings back tolife in perfect fossil form
(29:39):
anyone it has ever recorded,from great star to fleeting
extra. It brings back to life.Back.
Necromancy. Wicked, thrilling,and tied to our dialogue with
death. Which brings us back toAI. AI to me does not feel like
(30:03):
necromancy. AI is creating amonster from scraps of reality.
A version of something that werecognize but really only
sideways that is animated bysupernatural black box forces
that can give form to darkshapeless substances but cannot
(30:24):
bring into being the substanceitself. Man, how ignorant art
thou in thy pride of wisdom. Wethink we can harness the
monster, control it, maketrivial its consequences as we
channel lightning throughstitches and flesh electrifying
(30:46):
the slab that holds a hulkingbehemoth. We think it will do
our bidding with no reason tohave a life of its own. We have
fed our loved ones into the gutsof a machine so that we can
watch them dance.
Call In (31:13):
Still images, I I feel like have stood the test of time
more so maybe because they'vebeen around longer. It can be
more iconic. I think it is muchharder to have an iconic moving
image.
Hans Buetow (31:25):
Time is also built up as provenance. When we stand
in front of an originalpainting, we marvel at the
content and the craft, but alsoa physical presence. Seeing
where the artist's brush leftthe canvas and knowing that your
eyes and their eyes have seenthe same atoms. As John Berger
(31:47):
says, we believe in the powerand value of the original, the
genuine, the verifiable, as anearly religious object, not
because of what it shows us, butsimply because it has survived
long enough to show it to us.Saigon execution feels like that
(32:11):
and an AI animation of an imagefeels to me the opposite of
that.
It doesn't feel transportative,but strangely static. It doesn't
feel connected, but rerouted,tangential. John Berger's
corridor in an AI animation onlyruns for a moment before it hits
(32:32):
the black box of ones and zeros.
Call In (32:40):
I'm not sure why, but the first image that came to
mind is one that my grandfathertook back in 1912. And the photo
is of my grandmother standingclose-up in a field of corn
contemplating a corn cob. And Iget to put myself kind of in
(33:03):
place of my grandfather and howdid he see her in that moment.
We, I think, images. It still, Ithink, says more about the
person taking the image thanabout the image itself.
Hans Buetow (33:26):
All images are subject to perspective. They are
not moments themselves, butwindows into them.
Errol Morris (33:34):
Images, by their very nature, they they rip a
piece out of the fabric ofreality. They they take a swatch
out of reality. And in doing so,you you don't get to see above
and below. You don't get to seeleft and right. You just get to
(33:58):
see what's in the frame.
Hans Buetow (34:00):
Errol Morris likes to speculate about the elephant
that's just outside the frame,the one that the photographer
chose not to include in theirpicture of their Florida
vacation. Someone said, movethat elephant out of the way,
and then snapped the photo ortook the video. Either way,
because of the possible elephantoutside of every frame, we are
(34:21):
left only with the choices madeby the framer.
John Berger (34:25):
Paintings lend themselves to easy manipulation.
They can be used to makearguments or points which may be
different, very different fromtheir original meaning. And
because paintings areessentially silent and still,
The most obvious way ofmanipulating them is by using
movement and sound.
Hans Buetow (34:47):
John Berger here is talking about putting paintings
on TV. So zooming in on certainelements that will guide and
focus the audience with a newframe. Same thing with AI. By
animating a still image, you cancompletely change the frame. You
can pan right.
You can pan left. You can havethe camera move down the street.
You can theoretically reveal theelephant. But what if there was
(35:10):
no elephant to be revealed?
Call In (35:15):
There's more information in a moving image
for sure. There's just morecontext.
Hans Buetow (35:25):
Beyond the frame is everything else.
John Berger (35:28):
The meaning of an image can be changed according
to what you see beside it orwhat comes after it.
Hans Buetow (35:35):
An old photo is always instantly recognizable as
an old photo. In looking at alot of AI animations, however,
as soon as they start to movewith their perfect frame rates,
their smooth skin, their eerilydigital modernity, It puts the
old into a contemporary visuallanguage. The antiquated and
(35:58):
distant becomes relatable andimmediate. If you put it into
your feed, it wouldn't reallystand out as an old photo. It
would be imbued with the essenceof a TikTok.
But really, it would become lessjarring to put next to a TikTok.
And when it's more comfortableto ingest, it becomes easier to
(36:21):
digest.
John Berger (36:21):
What it means, in theory, is that reproduction of
works of art can be used byanybody for their own purposes.
Images can be used like words,we can talk with them.
Reproduction should make iteasier to connect our experience
of art directly with otherexperiences.
Hans Buetow (36:40):
We take them out of context, they start to say
something new, which can begood, even great sometimes. But
some swords have two edges.
Call In (37:04):
A still image is, more easily controllable, more easy
to hide the truth, actually.
Hans Buetow (37:14):
Are AI generated moving images a lie? Sure. But
so are moving images for all thereasons we've discussed framing,
intention, time. And so are allphotographs. All of them tell a
limited version of what there isto know.
They are all lies. Or are they?Here's Errol Morris again.
Errol Morris (37:38):
Well, don't believe that photographs are
either true or false. Never hasmade any sense to me. True seems
to be linguistic about arelationship of language to the
world, not of a photograph tothe world. Also, I believe all
(38:00):
photographs are posed. So ifsomeone tells me that one
photograph is more truthful thananother because it was or wasn't
posed, I think that's very veryclose to nonsense talk.
Hans Buetow (38:19):
This is a complicated conversation. There
are many smart people who havewritten and said many things
about this. But for ourpurposes, I don't think the
truth inherent in either movingor still images really matters
that much. I think about it sortof like Errol does. Like, I
think about one of my favoriteTV shows, the reality show Love
(38:41):
Island.
Situation is ridiculous, but theemotions are real.
Call In (38:49):
Yeah. There's all sorts of things to think about it.
Anyway
Anyways. I think that's all Igot for you right now.
Those are my thoughts. Hope thathelps.
Thanks again for reaching out.See you soon. Bye bye. Bye.
Hans Buetow (39:06):
So why does all this matter? The way we
perceive, the way we think abouttime, the truth inherent in
images, the emotions that theyevoke. Why do we care? Well,
it's because the emotions arereal. On 11/13/2021, at a
(39:33):
stoplight in Arizona, a mannamed Chris Pelkey was shot and
killed by another man in a roadrage incident.
After a three and a half yeartrial, the man who shot and
killed him, Gabriel Horcasidis,was convicted of manslaughter.
As first reported by four zerofour Media, this trial marked
(39:53):
the first time that testimonyfrom a murder victim was given
at his killer's sentencing, andit was accomplished using AI.
Pellke's sister wrote some copyand created an avatar that
looked and spoke like her deadbrother.
Christopher Pelkey Avatar: Picture and my voice profile. (40:17):
undefined
Hans Buetow (40:19):
There's a brief video of Pelkey, who's an army
veteran, that they used to makethe avatar, and then it cuts
back to the avatar who haltinglythanks the judge for all his
hard work. He says hisappreciation for everyone who
testified on his behalf, andthen he addresses his killer
directly.
Christopher Pelkey Avatar (40:36):
So I would like to make my own impact
statement to Gabriel Horkasidas,the man who shot me. It is a
shame we encountered each otherthat day in those circumstances.
In another life, we probablycould have been friends. I
believe in forgiveness and inGod who forgives. I always have,
and I still do.
Hans Buetow (40:58):
He's not really moving much. Just his mouth is
slightly animated. The audio isclipped at the end of every
sentence with clear AIartifacts, weird inflections,
multiple breaths, strangephrasing, and all of it was
written by his sister. This isweird enough to begin with. And
then I listened to what thejudge, Todd Lang, had to say
(41:21):
about it.
Judge Lang (41:25):
I love that AI. Thank you for that. And as angry
as you are and justifiably angryas the family is, I heard the
forgiveness, and I know misterHortacitas appreciate it, but so
did I. As I said, I like tothink I would do that. I don't
(41:46):
know that I would.
But I love the beauty in whatChristopher and I call him
Christopher. I always callpeople by their last names. It's
a formality of the court, but Ifeel like calling him
Christopher as we've gotten toknow him today. I feel that that
was genuine, that his obviousforgiveness of mister Jorge
(42:07):
Cicitas reflects the character Iheard about today. But it also
says something about the familybecause you told me how angry
you were, and you demanded themaximum sentence.
And even though that's what youwanted, you allowed Chris to
speak from his heart as you sawit. I didn't hear him asking for
(42:30):
the maximum sentence.
Hans Buetow (42:33):
Respectfully, your honor. No. You didn't. You
didn't hear it because he neversaid it because he's dead. What
you heard, everything that youheard, judge Lang, was the words
of his sister run through amachine, a sister who told four
(42:53):
zero four media in an interviewthat quote, our goal was to make
the judge cry.
Our goal was to bring Chris tolife and humanize him. Judge
Lang knows that this was AIgenerated, but you can hear over
the course of his comments howmuch he anthropomorphizes the
(43:13):
simulation. He calls itChristopher. He begins talking
about the victim in the presenttense. This has affected him.
Pelkey's sister accomplished hergoal. So the prosecution had
been asking for a sentence ofnine years. And then following
the testimony that he knewwasn't real, judge Lang gave
(43:36):
Gabriel Horkasidis the maximumsentence of ten and a half years
in prison. This isn't a personaldecision. Do I make an AI model
of my dead brother?
This is a societal question.Where? How? And how much of this
do we tolerate? I don't knowwhere to draw that line.
(44:00):
But one thing this makesabsolutely clear to me is that
even people whose job it is tosoundly, dispassionately, and
accurately evaluate and judgethings seem to be confused.
Maybe this is making a mountainout of a molehill. This is just
one person, after all. But thisis person in a position of
(44:21):
power, who has now set aprecedent. And this is not not
worrying.
I'm not not worried.
Judge Lang (44:39):
I'm not
Jeff Ongstad (44:39):
really sure why it's doing that.
Hans Buetow (44:41):
So there I am look too close. In this council
meeting this past March,watching example after example
of AI animating still imagesturning into videos.
Jeff Ongstad (44:48):
But it is kind of amazing how it can take these
and have all these kids move anddo stuff and we're this kid
keeps changing to differentpeople.
Hans Buetow (44:56):
I'm tempted by it.
Jeff Ongstad (44:58):
But it can look at something
Hans Buetow (44:59):
I'm repulsed by it. I feel like I can hold both of
those at once.
Jeff Ongstad (45:05):
And like if you looked at this kind of stuff,
probably like even six monthsago, was nowhere near this and I
figure in the next six monthsit'll progress even more. And I
know
Hans Buetow (45:15):
But I'm thinking, what do we think we're learning
from this? As media consumers,how much do we understand about
the power we're witnessing orwielding ourselves? I'm not sure
what lesson we're taking or moreprobably not taking.
Jeff Ongstad (45:31):
Something
Hans Buetow (45:33):
is happening. I'm not sure what, but we can see
that it's already having animpact.
Jeff Ongstad (45:40):
Do you have any questions I'd be happy to
answer?
City Council Member (45:45):
Questions from counsel? Jeff, thank you
very much.
Jeff Ongstad (45:49):
Thank you. And I can leave support we have.
City Council Member (45:52):
And yeah. This is great. And
Jeff Ongstad (45:55):
I'll use it I'll use my power wisely from now.
Thank you very much.
City Council Member (46:01):
Thank you. Appreciate you taking the time
to come out and give us theannual report.
Hans Buetow (46:23):
Huge, huge thank you to Doctor. Don Carlton for
talking to me for this segment.You can learn more about the
Eddie Adams collection and thewhole of the Dolph Briscoe
Center, it's very cool, atbriscoecenter.org. Thank you
also to Amy, Kevin, Kristen,Munna, Seth, Martha, Dana,
(46:45):
Eddie, James, and everyone elsewho submitted their thoughts and
recordings about the differencebetween a still and a moving
image. I am interested in whatyou think that difference is and
whether or not you would animateany of your family photos or any
other photos.
Please let me know. Get in touchat 651615507, drop us a line at
(47:10):
our website, or email us at theneverpost@gmail.com. I wanna
know how you feel about all ofit. All that in the show notes.
Mike Rugnetta (48:20):
That is the show we have for you this week. We're
gonna be back here in the mainfeed on Wednesday, June 18. In
(48:40):
2019, Rove Concepts, a furnituremanufacturer, surveyed 2,000
American households and foundthat the average couch contained
$1.55 in change. That is nearlyhalfway to a monthly Neverpost
membership. Go check the car.
Maybe that winter coat you putaway a couple months ago. The
(49:02):
chair by the window. The onethat you love to read in. That
has gotta have at least 30¢ init. What I'm saying here is that
there is $4 just laying aroundyour house that you're not even
using and we will.
We'll use it to pay our hostingcosts. We'll use it to pay
contributing producers. We'llput it towards our research
(49:24):
budget and more. Never poe dot st to become a member. $4 a
month.
That's just over two and a halfcouches worth of change. Never
post producers are Audrey Evans,Georgia Hampton, and the
mysterious. Doctor first name,last name. Our senior producer
(49:44):
is Hans Buto. Our executiveproducer is Jason Oberholzer,
and the show's host, that's me,is Mike Rignetta.
Moving, variant ornithography ofthose uninitiated made into
memory by the me brieflyincarnate. Full of myself on
(50:06):
successive nights dense andalone sings you back. Need keeps
the book of dying open, thelanguage common after all.
Relieved, the task finallychanging prompts, tapping my
reserve feeling now wise to itsedge. Where are you risk any
detail of what's in me havingbeen tricked by that image of
(50:30):
man?
Excerpt of Fourth Fourth by GilOtt. Never Post is a production
of Charts and Leisure and isdistributed by Radiotopia.
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