Our obsession with deadly game shows--from "The Running Man" and "Squid Game" to MrBeast's real-life reënactments--reflects a shift in the national mood to something increasingly zero-sum. It seems we can't get enough of game shows in which the losers die. "The Hunger Games" became a multibillion-dollar media franchise over the past decade, with audiences returning to the theatre, time and time again, to watch adolescents try to kill one another in an enormous arena--a contest devised by the leaders of a society rife with inequality. Netflix's " Squid Game " followed four hundred and fifty-six desperate individuals into an underworld where they play lethal versions of children's games in the hope of winning a life-changing amount of money. Four weeks after its release, the show had become Netflix's most-watched series ever; to date, the first season has been viewed more than two hundred and sixty-five million times.

MrBeast: AI means it's'scary times' for YouTube creators The world's biggest YouTuber, MrBeast, says the rapid advance of generative artificial intelligence (AI) is scary for the millions of creators currently making content for a living. AI tools that can create fully-formed videos from simple text prompts by users have made rapid advances in recent years. On social media, MrBeast, real name Jimmy Donaldson, asked what would happen to people like him when AI videos are just as good as normal videos. Fears about the impact AI will have on the jobs market are widespread - but particularly acute in the creative industries. In the film and video game industries, there has been extensive industrial action over the use of AI.

Fake AI pictures and videos will be nearly impossible to discern from real images as the technology behind deepfakes advances, University of California, Berkeley professor says. American television personality Gayle King has warned her followers about the dangers of artificial intelligence (AI) after she became the victim of a manipulated video. A video of King has circulated on Instagram in which she appeared to promote various weight loss products from a company known as Artipet. The sponsored post appeared on the feed of many of the "CBS Mornings'" host's one million followers. "Ladies, honestly, I did not expect my weight loss to spark so many questions. My direct messages on Instagram are overflowing," King can be heard saying in the video.

Last week, Ben Shapiro--editor emeritus of the conservative media organization the Daily Wire, prolific right-wing firebrand, and someone who seems to wear a blazer and button-up every day of his life--played a round of Minecraft on his YouTube channel. Often, the sandbox game is about the quiet joys of pastoral life, where players construct homesteads, rear livestock, and grow crops in a world made up entirely of perfectly equilateral cubes. It's also the best-selling game ever, which is why Minecraft videos tend to pop up on the channels of blue-haired Twitch celebrities, not a 39-year old political commentator who initially entered the upper tier of pundit-influencers as an anti-anti-Trump Republican who toured America's college campuses in order to argue with 19-year-olds about Marxism. Yet here he was, in 2023, doing his best to defeat the Ender Dragon for all five and a half million of his subscribers. "I'm still hitting the wrong buttons here, I'm not used to the controls," Shapiro said as he limply gestured his pickaxe toward a stone laden with glowing rubies.

The Web3 hype has dulled and artificial intelligence is taking its place. AI has entered the mainstream and people are using it to create artwork or write novels, captions or marketing copy. For creators, AI could serve as a personal assistant to design their YouTube thumbnails or draft podcast scripts. But some worry that the new technology will become smart enough to make them redundant. James Currier, general partner at seed-stage venture capital firm NFX, said AI won't replace creators, but will help them produce more and better content.