Is there a conspiracy going on? YouTubers have been silently complaining for months that something in their most recent video uploads didn't look right. Google has now acknowledged that it has been testing a tool that uses artificial intelligence (AI) to artificially enhance films, following a more thorough investigation by a well-known music channel. As part of its endeavor to "provide the best video quality," the business says, but it's strange that it started doing this without informing producers or providing a means for them to opt out of the trial.
Almost immediately after it started to roll out in YouTube Shorts earlier this year, Google's pilot sparked criticism. Strange artifacts, edge distortion, and distracting smoothness that appears to be AI manipulation were noticed by users. Google's video processing test has the effect of making things appear oversharpened or like an oil painting when you zoom in close after capturing a picture with your smartphone.
This isn't quite like the AI features Google has been packing into every other product, said Rene Ritchie, head of editorial at YouTube. Ritchie said in a post on X (previously Twitter) that the feature uses "traditional machine learning" to improve the image and minimize noise and blur rather than generative AI. This is a distinction without a difference, though, as video editing still involves some form of AI.
After speaking with another artist about the problem, YouTuber Rhett Shull started looking into what was happening to his videos. He soon started to believe that YouTube was using AI video processing without telling anyone about it; he refers to this as "upscaling," but Ritchie of Google argues that this is not actually upscaling technology.
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