If you’re active on social media and keep up to date with the fashion industry, you’ll probably have heard of internet sensation Lil Miquela (@lilmiquela on Instagram and Twitter) – an Instagram model, influencer and self-proclaimed activist. Lil Miquela first appeared on social media in 2016, quickly gaining thousands of followers and sparking interest all around the world, as people quickly started questioning whether Miquela was real. For 2 years Miquela’s identity was kept a secret, while the number of her followers skyrocketed and suspicions around her existence grew. Finally, in 2018, LA based company Brud came forward and officialy announced that Miquela was a digital art project created by them.
But what exactly is Brud? On their website they describe themselves as “transmedia studio that creates digital character driven story worlds, (…) story worlds that can create a more tolerant world by leveraging cultural understanding and technology”. Their team consists of artists, software specialist, storytellers and designers, who come together to create fictional characters and immerse them in real-life scenarios. While Lil Miquela is undoubtedly their most succesful project, Brud is also behing her fellow avatars BermudaisBae and Blawko22. They all interact together on social media, posting photos of each other having lunch, wearing the latest designer and streetwear clothes and meeting real-life celebrites. “The CGI celebrities” are causing quite the stir, and not only on the Internet. Miquela has currently over 1,5 mln followers on Instagram and the Instagram ‘model’ lives quite a busy life – she appeared in last year’s ad campaign for UGG, she took over Prada’s Instagram for Milan Fashion Week, she has been named by Path McGrath as her latest muse and the face of her make-up line, has released multiple songs on Spotify and other platforms, and even gave “interviews” to Vogue, the Guardian or the BBC. This year, Miquela is planning to create her own clothing brand and she is looking for help, you guessed it, on Instagram.
Lil Miquela pictured with Bermuda and Blawko – three robots created by Brud
But is not only Brud’s creations that are taking over social media – several other AI powered robots have been launched on social media and are becoming more and more in demand, when it comes to modeling campaigns (big names like Balmain or Fenty). It raises the question – are robots slowly taking over our world and are they integrating into our society? Miquela and other robots have been designed to ‘lead lives’ worthy of an Instagram post – their designers made a concious decision to make Miquela the latest ‘it girl’ and I believe their experiment turned out to be succesful – after all, for over 2 years Instagram users all over the world argued whether Miquela was just a mysterious influencer or a robot. People are actively observing Instagram robots, engaging with them in the comments, speculating with whom they will be photographed next and generally talking about them as if they were real.
Balmain’s campaign featuring robot models
I think this ‘experiment’ shows very acutely how social media platforms are often a facade, an illusion – after all, how much can we trust what we see on the Internet, when actual robots, who were designed by teams of specialists, are portrayed as if they were real? This phenomenon is much more than just another clever way of using AI and technology – it raises serious ethical questions, such as what is the role of AI in people’s lives, how people can eventually be surpassed by robots and even do robots have any rights?
I’m very curious as to what you all think of the role of robots and AI in our lives, especially about artificially generated ‘internet personas’. Let me know in the comments.
Sources:
https://www.instagram.com/lilmiquela/?hl=pl
http://brud.fyi/public-statement.html
https://qz.com/quartzy/1425735/dazed-just-hired-cgi-influencer-lil-miquela-as-its-arts-editor/
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-6317913/Computer-generated-model-Lil-Miquela-stars-Ugg-campaign.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lil_Miquela
Even though I use Instagram a lot, I didn’t know about this. This is a truly fascinating project. On the one hand, the robots don’t have feelings, therefore were created to engage in social media. People often are looking for social approval at Instagram or Snapchat. Many girls would like to have such “perfect looking” lives. So are they jealous of something probably doesn’t need their approval? On the other hand robots behaving like people is a utopian scenario. Couple years ago we could only fantasise about AI and robots or read about them in sci-fi books. Now, it’s becoming our reality. I wonder towards which way will it develop in the future.
Although, like Zuzanna, I use Instagram very often, I have never came across Lil Miquel’s profile. After reading this post, I visited profile of this robot out of curiosity and it really looks real, she and her whole “life”. It is amazing that someone managed to create something like that and attracted the attention of so many people. However, on the other hand, artificial intelligence begins to develop and enter our lives so quickly that it is scary to think what the future will look like.
It is truly fascinating, isn’t it? A little bit scary, especially if you just found out about it. I also often wonder what will our world look like in 10, 20 years from now – will it be totally different with AI and all this technology? I guess we will see soon! I’m glad you learned about Lil Miquela from my post!
Sorry, doesn’t look real for me… But anyhow, it’s fascinating how people are able to create life, stories and basically other “people”. This means that in the future there is possibility, that there’re going to be less and less real life models, because who needs real people, when you can create a person in a way you like it to look like. Then you just create a robot, who can walk on a catwalk, add the “skin” and boom – there is your perfect model, who has life, ambitions and so on. How they are going to develop it? Who knows, but for sure there is a chance they will go with the path i stated
Never heard of her, but wow it is actually so cool and of course compered to humans it does not really look real but still it is impressive. The details, the looks, I am impressed. Cool thing about her is the fact that she was actually spotted by big brands.
Never heard of it, but it seems like a pretty fascinating concept of how people could interact with AI and robots and actually get along. IMO it doesn’t look real at all (especially on some of the photos) so I’m not sure how people could even question this. The idea is fun and has clearly gone a long way, but one thing that strikes me that with this there are no limitations. People can create extreme beauty and raise the standards, illustrate the so called “perfection” and in result make some people feel inferior.