I had a dream I was negotiating an AOR agreement with a prospect client’s sourcing, and stumbled upon this line in the contract: “Agency agrees all AI-generated work will be reduced in cost 20% since it is not solely the product of human output.” And in the meeting, the sourcing person made reference to the Patent Office not allowing AI-generated work to be trademarked. So, how could this marketer truly benefit if we delivered “augmented” work?
And in the dream I offered a compromise: Our agency would provide a clean room with no computers or smartphones allowed—only pen and paper, and we could use badge in/out records to verify which humans were in or out, and when. But the hourly rate for human-only generated output in those rooms would be 4X the proposed blended hourly rate.
After all, if we truly believe human-only output is more valuable than augmented, it ought to be worth significantly more, right?
Likewise, how do we distinguish between machine-augmented and purely human contributions in a world where AI is increasingly pervasive? Picture an agency using Microsoft, Google or Adobe, now infused with AI at every turn. How can any services firm quantify human vs. augmented work for its clients? (Those last three sentences were initially generated by AudioPen then edited by me.)
There was a long pause.
“How about a 3X markup, and we’ll cap clean room hours at 4-5 per person per week?” they countered.
I should have asked for 7X.
Monday’s AI for Artists and Entrepreneurs focuses on text-to-video, and in Tuesday’s Persuasion & Marketing class we’re going to enter the realm of politics.