Taylor Swift Fans Accuse the Singer of Using AI in Her Google Scavenger Hunt Videos
In preparation for releasing her twelfth album, “The Life of a Showgirl”, Taylor Swift held an online scavenger hunt for her fans this weekend that asked the users to search “Taylor Swift” on Google as their first task. However, the fans soon unveiled the secret videos a part of a campaign and identified that a few clips were AI-generated, which left many fans unpleased.
The Google displayed a cryptic message when the user searched the singer’s name. The message was, “12 cities, 12 doors, 1 video to unlock”. As per the online scavenger, the fans had to identify the location of doors to scan a QR code, which would surface 12 videos carrying several hints to solve the puzzle. After fans searched the correct phrase on Google, another orange door appeared, which needed the user to knock by clicking 12 million times. Finally, when the door opened, it revealed a lyric video for “The Fae of Ophelia” having its own orange door progress bar on YouTube.
The scavenger hunt was initially announced by Google through a video on Instagram. The video begins with an aerial view of Earth and then zooms in on a hilly and bejeweled landscape, followed by the scene of an orange door overlaid with a Google search bar.
While fans have often loved puzzles, many seemed to be disappointed with the 12 clue-containing videos that looked to be AI-generated. Instead of continuously searching for the clues, many fans steered their way to detect video clips to find the concrete evidence of scenes being synthetic. However, no confirmation or solid evidence of clips being AI-generated has been identified.
However, if this is an AI-generated video that Taylor Shift created in collaboration with Google, it can be a good opportunity for the tech giant to show off its Veo3 model against the recently launched Sora 2 video generator tool from OpenAI.
The use of artificial intelligence in the creative and fan-oriented professions has always been a sensitive subject. While many favor the use of AI to encourage creativity, other opposes for LLMs to reuse original work from artists without any consent.
Recently, Taylor Swift also commented about the AI danger when President Donald Trump shared an AI-generated image showing her supporting his campaign. Taylor wrote in her Instagram post, “Recently, I was made aware that an AI of ‘me’ falsely endorsing Donald Trump’s presidential run was posted to his site. It really conjured up my fears around AI and the dangers of spreading misinformation. It brought me to the conclusion that I need to be very transparent about my actual plans for this election as a voter.”
Still, no reliable claims have been found for the clips being AI-generated. While some artists prefer to use AI to cut costs, billionaire musicians have sufficient resources to create the fantastical scenes all by themselves.
