TikTok is introducing a fresh option that permits them to lessen the quantity of AI-made content appearing in their timelines. This move comes as the company disclosed that it now features over 1 billion content made with AI.
Trial and Implementation
The new functionality is being tested over the coming weeks before a widespread rollout. This advancement coincides with a surge in AI content, fueled by emerging video-generation tools.
The Broader AI Trend
Studies have shown that almost one in 10 of the most rapidly expanding video streams on a competing service exclusively feature content made by AI. A considerable share of this material is considered “AI slop”, a term for poor-quality, bulk-generated content that is often nonsensical or bizarre.
“We know from our community that a lot of users appreciate content created using AI tools, including computer-generated images to educational videos, and we aim to give people the ability to increase or decrease of that, according to their own likes,” said a spokesperson.
Volume and Proportions
The service announced that there are currently 1.3bn videos on its app identified as made with AI. In total, more than 100 m pieces of content are uploaded to the app every day, making clips made by AI a relatively small part of its total content library.
User Control Features
Viewers will be able to decrease or raise the amount of artificial media they see by opening the topic control setting in the app and choosing the AI content topic. Additional categories that currently be modified under the setting cover news, clothing, beauty, and movement.
Content Labeling and Policies
The platform’s guidelines oblige creators to identify convincing AI-made content, and it bans malicious AI impersonations of public figures or crisis events. Any authentic-looking artificial content that is not labeled can be removed under its user guidelines.
Additionally, the platform will now add an “AI-made” tag to content made using its built-in AI features, or flagged by an cross-platform project for identifying artificial media. This action is intended to help prevent users from seeking to circumvent the tagging system.
Responsible AI Funding
TikTok is furthermore introducing a two million dollar AI literacy fund for experts and institutions to develop educational content about ethical AI use. This project will benefit educational bodies dedicated to educating coding and technology.
Content Safety Approach
TikTok has defended its safety measures, amid debate over plans to make redundant a large number of safety staff in the United Kingdom. TikTok is planning to cut a significant number of roles in its user protection department in its British office, with labor groups and digital protection specialists expressing worry that people are being substituted by machine-led review.
A company official clarified that human moderation would continue to be important, but artificial intelligence can protect employees by filtering out the most harmful content prior to it has to be seen by humans. The company stated a notable drop in explicit and harmful content handled by safety staff over the previous year due to the use of its automated systems.
We believe it is crucial to integrate staff and AI to keep the platform safe,” the official commented. “We’ll have staff as part of that process, but we also think it’s extremely critical to reduce exposure to unsafe media as swiftly, which is why a lot of the machine support is making a difference work at speed.”
