Major YouTube creators are facing backlash for accepting AI money

Key Highlights

• The caption for Kolder’s video appears to contain what looks like an affiliate link, offering a 30 percent discount on an annual Higgsfield subscription.
• 5 functionality and pitch these technologies as the future of video production.
• 5 as innovative tools that have the potential to revolutionize the entertainment industry.
• 5’s capabilities with AI-manipulated footage of himself placed in different sci-fi settings.
• (After this piece was published, Higgsfield PR manager Nuray Omarkhan said that “the creators were compensated through a negotiated combination of monetary payment and Higgsfield credits.

Over the past few days, a number of prominent filmmaking content creators including Matti Haapoja and Sam “Kold” Kolder have posted videos of themselves demonstrating what’s possible with AI platform Higgsfield.

The videos highlight Higgsfield’s recently added Seedance 2.

5 functionality and pitch these technologies as the future of video production.

In response to these videos, other creators started sharing what appear to be screenshots of partnership offers they’d received from PR firms working on Higgsfield’s behalf.

All of this led fans to the conclusion that Higgsfield has been trying to use creators to boost its profile and garner goodwill from the public.

Almost immediately, fans began dragging Haapoja and Kolder for seemingly working with Higgsfield.

Haapoja’s and Kolder’s videos are not labeled as ads and neither of the creators responded to The Verge’s questions about whether these were paid partnerships.

(After this piece was published, Higgsfield PR manager Nuray Omarkhan said that “the creators were compensated through a negotiated combination of monetary payment and Higgsfield credits.

) But in producing and posting videos that feel very much like ads for Higgsfield, both creators left portions of their audiences feeling alienated.

Haapoja and Kolder enthusiastically frame Higgsfield and Seedance 2.

5 as innovative tools that have the potential to revolutionize the entertainment industry.

Haapoja’s is kind of like an infomercial where he explains how Cully Hill Boys -- Higgsfield’s feature-length film starring AI-generated duplicates of YouTubers Mikyle “N3on” Rafiq and Matt Kiatipis -- was produced with prompts.

Haapoja also demonstrates Seedance 2.

5’s capabilities with AI-manipulated footage of himself placed in different sci-fi settings.

Kolder’s video -- titled “AI is replacing me” -- tells a story that starts off with an explanation of Kolder’s background in video production before it becomes a fictionalized, Chappie-esque narrative in which he explores Mauritania with the help of a robot.

Both videos blend footage of real people with distinctly uncanny AI-generated imagery.

On Threads, Haapoja’s video was met with pushback from fans and other creators who consider him their peer.

Marques Brownlee took issue with Haapoja likening generative AI to the Canon EOS 5D Mark II (an iconic DSLR known for making shooting in 1080p full HD more affordable for independent filmmakers).

Unlike the overwhelmingly negative feedback to Haapoja’s video, Kolder’s comments section on YouTube was more of a mixed bag, with many viewers responding positively. But for every few “absolute cinema!” or “amazing transitions!” comments, there are people lamenting that “AI defeated our king” and insisting that “no AI can replace creative artists.”

The negative reactions to Haapoja’s and Kolder’s videos have been much louder than most of the responses to some of Higgsfield’s other recent creator collaborations. Cully Hill Boys debuted last week without all that much fanfare, which made it seem like viewers might not have had particularly strong feelings either way about it. When you scroll through some of the posts that Cully Hill Boys’ cast shared about the film, there’s a mix of AI boosters cheering Higgsfield on and people knocking the company for being a slop purveyor. For the most part, those criticisms haven’t been aimed at the film’s cast -- who gave Higgsfield the right to use their likenesses, but were otherwise not as directly involved in the project’s production as traditional actors would be.