Is the AI Good for Your Venue?
I’m sure you’ve heard all about the ‘chat GPTs’ and the ‘models’(not the pretty ones) from some of your nerdy friends. Sometimes they’ll derail entire meetings to hype up this new thing that’s apparently going to ‘change your life’ and ‘take everyone’s jobs’. They start breathing heavily and get all sweaty, it’s a whole thing. Not to enable Steve the computer guy even more, but it’s partially true. In the tech industry, AI is already causing a significant disruption. We're also starting to see the impact of AI in areas like data analytics, language, robotics, education, accounting, art, and research to name a few. It's driving efficiency, automating tasks, enabling new services, improving accuracy, buttering your bread (alright maybe not yet) and opening up entirely new areas of research and development. But is this good for theatres and comedy clubs? Is it good for ticket management systems? Is it even something you should read about? Too late you already are! The crazy progress in the AI field is likely not going to stop any time soon, and some are calling it more disruptive than the internet itself. As your patrons and competitors start using it, what should you do? Let’s cover some important points every theatre should consider when it comes to AI, and talk about the best ways the industry is adapting.
The image above shows an exponential increase in the number of scientific papers published by the brightest minds into the field of Machine Learning (ML) and AI. To say there is some hype would be a tremendous understatement.
Stanford’s annual AI index report provides some great insights into trends in the industry, let’s quickly cover the big takeaways. It seems that AI has finally hit its rebellious phase, deciding it's cooler to hang out with industry rather than academia. Before 2014 academic institutions were the major AI players, but private enterprise has taken over in recent years. In 2022 private industry released 32 AI models compared to a lonely trio from academia.
What's a model? A model in this context is simply a clever guessing computer program. Imagine you're playing a game where you have to guess the number of candies in a jar. At first, you might not know where to start. But if someone tells you the jar's size and shape, and the size of the candy, you might start to make better guesses. If you keep playing the game over and over again, with different jars and different candies, you'll get even better at guessing because you learn from each guess. An AI model works in a similar way. It starts off not knowing much, but it gets "trained" by looking at lots of examples, like photos of cats and dogs. By checking whether its guesses are right or wrong, and adjusting based on that, it learns to recognize the difference between a cat and a dog. So, the next time it sees a picture it's never seen before, it can make a good guess whether it's a cat or a dog. This is a simple example of an AI model. Models can be trained for guessing candies in a jar, identifying animals, understanding speech, setting ticket prices, driving cars, or even guessing a single person’s interests, to name a few. The various AI models around the world have been smashing records left and right and we’re still just dipping our toes into the possibilities. Not to mention 41% of code on github (a popular code repository for programmers) is now AI generated. With this in mind, it’s important to expect more informed patrons in coming months and years. More people will have access to AI tools that find them the best value seats and highest rated shows. Competing theatres and clubs will also likely start using AI to stay on top of passing trends to better help build an edge in the market.
While the potential is great, the AI industry has caught some flack from the climate-conscious community. New research shows that AI's environmental footprint can be as hefty as a frequent flyer, with some larger models belching out 25 times more carbon than a one-way trip from New York to San Francisco during training. On the brighter side, AI's also helping reduce energy use, showing it's not all doom and gloom. There have been tremendous strides in increasing efficiency in training these massive models, with some industry innovators like Emad Mostaque claiming these massive models will be running on smart phones without any internet access within a couple years. In the labs, AI is becoming the nerdy best friend scientists never knew they needed. It's playing a big role in advancements from hydrogen fusion to generating new antibodies. It’s a double-edged sword like any powerful new tool though, the misuse of AI is on a steady rise, with incidents increasing 26-fold since 2012, including deepfakes (a convininc fake picture or video of someone) and prison call-monitoring. It seems AI has been watching too much sci-fi and got the wrong idea about being the villain. AI skills are becoming hotter than summer in Death Valley. From 2021 to 2022, AI-related job postings in the US (except for sectors like agriculture and hunting) increased from 1.7% to 1.9%. For the first time in a decade, private investment in AI took a dip, falling by 26.7% in 2022. Seems even money bags need a breather sometimes, though the decade as a whole saw a hefty 18-fold increase in AI investment. AI adoption among companies has more than doubled since 2017, although it seems to have hit a brief plateau recently. Interestingly but not terribly surprising, companies that have adopted AI are reporting cost decreases and revenue increases - kind of like an "AI dividend." In the land of the legalese, policymakers are turning their gaze towards AI, with a sharp increase in AI-related bills being passed - from just 1 in 2016 to 37 in 2022. It’s obvious that AI has become the new hot topic at the water cooler. Public opinion about AI varies worldwide. In China, 78% of people believe AI products and services have more benefits than drawbacks, while in the US, this figure stands at 35%. It’s like pineapple on pizza - some love it, some... not so much.
As seen above, while AI conference attendance has taken a slight slump, open source projects involved in AI continue to increase, the latter being a great trend to see as it allows access to this fascinating field by anyone with an internet connection. If you have a web guy for maintaining your club website and ticketing infrastructure, you’ll likely see huge savings from making sure they know how to use AI tech assistants. Using these assistants effectively can reduce the hours they bill significantly.
We're obviously seeing the effects and integration of AI in the world of theatre and improv. What once seemed the exclusive domain of human creativity is now being nudged by AI. AI has started generating fairly convincing scripts and improv prompts, offering an unexpected twist to the creative process. Imagine a dynamic and interactive theatre experience where AI responds in real-time to actors or audience input, creating a unique performance each time. The Royal Shakespeare Company and Young Vic are just a couple examples of organizations that are already experimenting with AI like this. But it's not just about the performances themselves. AI's interaction with actors and audiences presents a deeper exploration of what it means to be human. It invites us to ask questions about consciousness, agency, and emotion, leading to performances that can be both thought-provoking and powerful.
As always, we have to consider the potential challenges and ethical considerations. Could AI devalue human creativity and skill, or lead to performances that feel artificial or lack emotional depth? What about the risk of bias in AI systems, or the necessity of respecting audience privacy in interactive performances? Well in event recommendation, AI is proving to be a game-changer. AI excels in creating personalized experiences for customers. It's like having a digital concierge that constantly learns your specific taste. AI algorithms in streaming apps are already heavily used to serve content suggestions based on viewing behavior, which has been cited as the most common way of movie and TV show discovery by 28% of U.S. consumers. Spotify, for instance, has leveraged AI for its AI DJ, which curates playlists based on a user's past listening habits. AI is also being used for upselling and cross-selling, with approximately 9 out of 10 consumers more likely to shop with brands that supply offers and recommendations that are relevant to them. By analyzing data sets from concerts, sporting events, and theatre tickets, AI can make spot-on recommendations based on consumer preferences. This includes taking into account factors like how quickly tickets sell, historical attendance statistics, and even how well tickets typically sell at a particular venue or in a specific city. The result? A tailored, personalized experience that keeps customers coming back for more. Imagine your patrons getting emails suggesting events that are based off of all of the small details of their previous experiences at your venues.
The primary use for AI that we’re seeing is in forecasting and process optimization. AI here is like a crystal ball predicting attendance and optimizing venue mapping. It can even predict no-show trends, helping to mitigate empty seats. AI can also forecast how patrons may arrive at the venue, helping to adjust queue processing and aid in procurement planning for merchandise, food, and beverages. A bit like having a super-smart event planner on your team. We touched on this in our Dynamic Pricing articles, but pricing strategy is another area where AI is making a mark. By analyzing various data sets about past events, AI helps event organizers and ticket vendors create effective pricing strategies. This leads to increased revenue, though it does come with its challenges, like the risk of frequent price changes leading to patron rabbles. We can look at the sports broadcasting industry for some inspiration, where AI has transformed the industry by automating tracking and analyzing players, enabling virtual advertising, and personalizing content creation. In education, a recent study found that 89% of teachers believe AI will make their job easier and more efficient, while 94% believe it will improve student engagement and allow for personalized learning plans for different students.
And let's not forget fraud detection. AI's got your back here too. By identifying and preventing fraudulent activities such as ticket scalping, AI ensures a safer ticketing environment. For instance, the National Football League (NFL) has partnered with Pogoseat, an AI technology company, to fight ticket fraud and provide a more personalized experience for fans. The AI recommendation engine considers factors like the fan's location, the teams they follow, their previous purchases, and even their social media activity. As a result, the NFL can offer personalized ticket recommendations and accommodations, driving up fan satisfaction, which makes them all the more eager to spend more money.
The world seems to be moving faster than ever due to this new AI hype, so you’re in good company if you feel overwhelmed with new information every day. If you want to get into the weeds on the technical aspect of AI then one place to start is the "arXiv" (pronounced "archive", because who doesn't love a good science pun?). It's an open-access repository where researchers post their latest findings before they're even published. It's like getting a sneak peek. You can check out the Computational Linguistics category for the latest on LLMs. There's also Twitter for more bite sized and distilled nuggets. Many AI researchers and enthusiasts are active on Twitter, sharing insights, news, and views. Some handles to start with would be @OpenAI or @sama (an OpenAI founder), or hashtags like #AI or #StableDiffusion (although make sure you’re home for that last one as you might see some NSFW AI generated content). Blogs are also a great resource. Google's AI Blog and OpenAI's blog both offer deep dives into the latest AI developments. There are a budding host of youtube channels constantly talking on the topic as well, but it’s certainly getting harder to tell which ones are generated by AI themselves, and which ones have living breathing people talking in them. You can almost guess a channel’s budget by how lifelike their voices sound. And last but not least, simply jump on chat.openai.com and chat with the free AI model. Ask the model any question about AI or anything and have a long chat, you’ll surely come away smarter.
Remember, it's okay to feel overwhelmed or iffy about integrating AI. After all, even the people on the bleeding edge of this field are getting their minds blown on an almost weekly basis. It’s certainly worth it to occasionally read headlines about the industry and to poke various new tools coming out aimed at helping venues, you never know what kind of treasures you’ll find. While it may seem like a bubble that rivals the dot com bubble, it’s certainly a relatively massive one that’s currently only picking up more steam. While the main focus by these tech leaps has largely been applied to the education sector, it pays to be nimble and experiment with how it can help yours as well. Surely a club that is crafty in its AI applications will have a significant advantage in the market. While Fourth Wall Tickets may use some of these tools in development, it’s always in the interest of our clients. It can be a great learning tool that can save you a ton of time in your projects. It’s like having an intern with a bad memory, and pretty soon the memory issue will be fixed. The free bot on chat.openai.com is a version 3.5, but for $20 a month you can play around with a version 4, which is noticeably more intelligent. If you have any opinions or insights into how AI has affected your venue or productions, we’d love to hear from you!
https://aiindex.stanford.edu/report/
https://softjourn.com/insights/top-event-ticketing-industry-trends
https://softjourn.com/insights/how-ai-is-transforming-the-ticketing-industry