The hype around AI means a lot of things in the current communications environment, but it clearly does not lead to a blank check. We discovered this over the past week as the hottest attraction in artificial intelligence less than six months ago became the latest casualty. The Sora video creation platform may have been cool, but it’s also dead.
I remember a day in early October well. I had seen a few crazy AI videos pop up on my feed, and suddenly all those AI emails and newsletters that fill my box were telling me Sora was going to change the world of video as we know it.
I had already worked with some AI video for a client, so I wanted to try this out. But using a tactic of many good marketers, OpenAI, Sora’s parent company, was increasing the hype by making it hard to get. It was by invitation only! The night club was limiting the people inside so they could create a big, enticing line at the door.
I reached out to a friend who I knew would be plugged into this, and he provided me with an invitation. I entered, created a couple of fairly stupid videos of myself, then moved on to work that was actually beneficial to Chemistry PR and Multimedia. This was a TIkTok parlor trick on steroids, and fairly frightening to Hollywood, but there was little I could do with it to generate anything beyond a laugh. (Certainly not revenue thanks to the Sora logo that was on everything it generated.)
As it turns out, I was far from alone. I had all but forgotten about Sora until I saw OpenAI had abruptly shut it down while I was on vacation. I didn’t even catch it on a news feed until a week after it happened. It didn’t generate that much interest. This may be because they had apparently been hemorrhaging users for months.
Sora’s technology did not fail. The cool factor was not lacking. Sora’s inability to make money for its owner or its users proved to be the fatal flaw, and there is a lesson here for the entire world of artificial intelligence along with everyone else: you better have practical uses, and you better make them easy to find and apply for your audience.
If you are like me you are being inundated with AI tools, AI courses, and AI advice via email, text, and seemingly all other forms of communication. It would be impossible to tell you the number of companies and consultants who have pinged me over the last year. There are too many. What I can come closer to telling you is the number that I have interacted with and used: about a dozen.
What they all share in common is they showed me something in their arsenal that can make my life easier. ChatGPT can help me with research. Claude can do rudimentary back-end coding that I’m not experienced with. Seedance can help me create white-label video that I can actually use for a client. Otter can take notes on my calls. Hub Spot’s reports work well. There are a few newsletters that provide a good overview of the industry so I can feel up to date. There are others, but those are a few highlights. I use nearly every one of them daily. As for all the rest: I am a willing adopter, but you better tell me how the product makes my life easier, better, or more efficient. Spamming me into submission is not the answer.
Interestingly, this all goes back to a phrase we use often with our clients here at Chemistry PR and Multimedia: “What’s in it for me?” When we communicate for a client, that is the question we are trying to answer for their audience. If you don’t provide that answer, the audience is not going to be interested. (If you need help with this, by the way, you really should give us a buzz!)
Apparently no one has mentioned this to a number of the AI companies, and now, after months of non-stop chatter and hype, this somewhat traditional lesson is being learned in a very hard way.
In the case of Sora, there was little in it beyond a chuckle for the audience they were engaging. They never demonstrated why someone should pay for it. Meanwhile, The Wall Street Journal reports the platform was losing $1 million each day.
So now AI is experiencing the growing pains so many others have endured before them. No matter how “hot” your industry is, there is no such thing as a blank check. You make money if you show your customer what is in it for them. If you don’t do that, you were likely finished before you started. Just ask Sora.
