Pop Culture, Fandoms and Neural Networks: Fans Meet AI
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.14515/monitoring.2024.5.2602Keywords:
fan culture, fandoms, popular culture, artificial intelligence, generative AIAbstract
The article is dedicated to analyzing and conceptualizing the processes of disseminating AI technologies in fan culture. The author examines fandoms as mediatized creative communities, reveals the relationship between artificial intelligence and fan culture, and identifies the practices of generative AI reception using the example of two fan communities. The article highlights the main lines of intersection between AI and fandom: AI technologies modify objects of fan interest; change the space, structure, and creative practices of fandoms; are integrated into innovative fan services; are used for fandom analytics; foreground issues of ethics and law in participatory cultures. The expansion of artificial intelligence (neural networks in particular) has caused a polarization of fandom: while some fans actively use neural networks to edit and create content, others consider it inappropriate. Preliminary observations in two fan communities showed that critical and protest fan discourses around generative AI are focused on three ideas: a) the use of AI contradicts the concept of fandom; b) toda’s AI as a technology is imperfect; c) current practices in AI training and application are unethical. The article outlines further prospects for studying the interaction of fandoms with artificial intelligence, which will expand the boundaries of both fan studies and social studies of AI.
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