Mountainhead writer and director Jesse Armstrong has said he’s “pretty sure that the AI companies have been scraping my material along with everyone else’s to train their large language models,” and that to find the right voices for the movie’s tech-bro characters, “I’ve been scraping them back.”
Mountainhead, which lands on HBO this weekend, is a dark satire about a group of tech billionaires who retreat to a secluded mountain lodge during a global crisis — a crisis that’s exacerbated by their own creations, including highly convincing AI-generated deepfakes and a social media platform that fuels misinformation and instability.
Speaking in an interview broadcast on Tuesday by the BBC’s The World Tonight, Armstrong said that his “scraping” process involved accessing large amounts of content online to help him shape the characters’ voices, “especially the tech CEOs and founders, because they all make themselves available on innumerable podcast and TED talks.”
The Succession showrunner and co-writer added: “It was crucial for me to tune into their particular voices, partly the vocabulary, a bit the philosophy, the whole package of how they approach the world with this tremendous confidence. Getting that voice was actually the reason that I pitched the film because I couldn’t get that overweening confident voice out of my head, and it’s a funny voice because it lacks a certain amount of self-awareness.”
AI companies like ChatGPT creator OpenAI, Google, and Meta are known to use (or scrape) online content to train their large language models (LLMs), which power the AI platforms. It’s a controversial issue, with creators understandably upset at having their content used without permission, recognition, or payment.
On the topic of how generative AI could impact his own industry, Armstrong commented that “eventually it will be able to do pretty much everything.”
When asked if it can already write as well as him, Armstrong laughed, saying, “People can judge for themselves,” adding, “At the moment, the part of it which is creative is somewhat limited. Their large language models are predictive and they give you a bit of what you want and a bit of what they think might come next so they’re pretty good at mimicry, not great at creativity. But I’m sure that part will come.”
Mountainhead premieres on HBO on Saturday, May 31.
At its annual developers conference this year, Apple announced a set of sweeping changes across its software platforms, introducing a whole new design
Over the past four years, the MacBook Air has been the primary driver of my computing duties. My prerequisites for finding a light, powerful, and reli
OpenAI has made GPT-4.1 more widely available, as ChatGPT Plus, Pro, and Team users can now access the AI model. On Wednesday, the brand announced tha
OpenAI is reconfiguring its rollout plan for upcoming AI models. The company’s CEO, Sam Altman shared on social media on Friday that it will delay the
It’s somewhat unnerving to hear an AI talking in an eerily friendly tone and telling me to clean up the clutter on my workstation. I am somewhat proud
Amazon introduced a new AI-charged version of Alexa a few weeks ago, and as promised, has finally started rolling out early access to it. Alexa+, as t
OpenAI is set to be the next open-source AI brand as CEO Sam Altman confirmed on X on Monday that the company will soon release an “open-weight’ model
MicrosoftMicrosoft Support announced an improvement to the Phone Connection app in a blog post. The update makes tasks like messaging, setting alarms,
We are a comprehensive and trusted information platform dedicated to delivering high-quality content across a wide range of topics, including society, technology, business, health, culture, and entertainment.
From breaking news to in-depth reports, we adhere to the principles of accuracy and diverse perspectives, helping readers find clarity and reliability in today’s fast-paced information landscape.
Our goal is to be a dependable source of knowledge for every reader—making information not only accessible but truly trustworthy. Looking ahead, we will continue to enhance our content and services, connecting the world and delivering value.
