Today we're talking about the future of AI and entertainment. And I think it's such an interesting place to be right now because I feel like the arts world and the creative community and the AI world are actually a lot closer than they may know that they are.

I want to share a bunch of thoughts and ideas on this. And let's jump into it.

So my name is Will Briarley from a company called DreamKey. I started building this tech about seven years ago, making generative animated shows for Adult Swim. We've done stuff for GSN, for a bunch of different folks over the years.

And I had an off-Broadway show that was performed by an AI bot that was This was before COVID stuff. So this was happening a while back.

And then when COVID happened, the show went away. The Adult Swim got bought by Time Warner. Those shows went away.

But I kept building the tech and ended up doing a virtual performance with Baryshnikov that ended up getting the critics pick of the New York Times and a whole bunch of, you know, we just kept building on it. And then all this AI stuff really started blowing up.

And people were like, wait a minute. haven't you been working on this stuff a little bit? I'm like, yeah.

So we ended up putting together a team. We have a CEO right here, Keith. And there's five of us all over the place. And we're trying to do this.

And I mean, the tech works right now. So I'm going to show you a quick little sample of what we're up to.

Uh, hey everyone. This is Ted. My name is Horace. I'm Lange. Clancy here. I am Malachi the Brave. My name is Jerry.

My name is T-Bone Pickens and welcome to DreamKey. Welcome to DreamKey.

DreamKey. DreamKey. DreamKey. Welcome to DreamKey.

Using original AI-based tech, DreamKey allows for the creation of exciting, interactive, animated shows with infinite episodes. 1DreamKey shows are lightly interactive, narrative-driven experiences where the audience can be a part of the story by interacting live, influencing plotlines, and more. All happening live

This audience interactivity leads to long watch times and heavy engagement. When you're part of the show, why stop watching? And since DreamKey can create infinite episodes, the content is always on and always different.

With DreamKey, it only takes a small team to bring an entire animated show to life. Faster, easier, and more cost-effective than ever before. With DreamKey, show production is months faster and millions cheaper than traditional animation.

1We at DreamKey believe in ethical AI content creation, which is why our tech has creator attribution and royalty tracking built in, something no other company can boast. No matter how an artist contributes to a DreamKey show, their contribution can be tracked moment to moment so they can be paid for their work.

DreamKey is not just transforming animation, it's redefining how audiences engage with stories. AI innovation, built-in royalty tracking, and seamless interactivity means DreamKey empowers creators and captivates viewers in ways never before possible.

DreamKey isn't just the future of animation, it's the future of storytelling. Dive into the DreamKey universe where imagination meets innovation and everyone has a role to play.

And there's a huge difference in how we're doing it compared to, say, video generation tools and things like that. We can do full shows where they're consistent, they make sense, they're actually interesting, and they're made by people who have made actual hit TV shows.

But I want to bring it back all the way back to when I was really young because we're going to go a few places here. So when I was young, I would sit by the river behind my house, the sun sinking into my skin, watching the gentle current of the river bend the light, transforming into a solid river, into something shifting, something impossible to hold, a painted turtle sitting on a rock, blinking in slow motion, completely unbothered by time.

A maple tree with its roots dipped into the water, just like the newest secret about survival that humans had forgotten. I sat there thinking about how much time had to happen for that moment to exist.

The way the river had carved through the land, shaping it through century after century. The way the turtle had somehow known through generations of instinct to return to that exact rock. The way the trees had fought for their place, stretching, adapting, twisting their way into the space where they were given.

The world isn't necessarily that random. It's probabilities and invisible rules all playing out over time.

Most of the time we don't notice it, but sometimes when you stop and look closely, you can see the patterns in the best way that we can. The way things fall into place, shaping everything that came before.

I think about that a lot now because I'm standing here in this room speaking with you just like that river, just like the turtle, just like the trees. I'm here because of a million small things that came before this moment and everything is leading into something.

And right now we're standing on the edge of something pretty enormous. AI isn't just the future of entertainment, it's the present.

It's moving forward like that river, carving new landscapes as it moves. We won't see the full impact until years from now, but make no mistake, the shape of creativity, of business, of how we trust and engage in what's real is already being rewritten.

And if we don't take time to decide what kind of world we want to build, someone else is going to decide for us.

So this is something really, really important that I want to talk to you about. And I know you're all here for it.

Doritos branded wired earbuds. So let's talk about it.

It's the kind of thing you see in the store and it makes you say, all right, wait. Who came up with this idea? You want people to listen to music through tortilla chip branding.

So if you step back, you look in the invisible forces that shape everything, you realize it kind of does make sense. Somewhere in some office, a calculation was made, a probability equation played out. And they didn't know how it was going to work, but they knew it probably would.

We like to think the world is random, but most of it's just these systems interacting with each other, interacting based on their own set of rules. And this is how a lot of our system works in AI in a lot of ways.

People say AI isn't creative because it simply predicts what the most probable outcome is. But isn't that exactly how a skilled creator does it?

Using deeper intuition, hard-earned knowledge guiding their choices, musicians selecting their note because they've internalized scales and harmonies and rhythms over thousands of hours of practice, painters choosing their next brushstroke space informed by years of studying color theory, perspective, and composition, and filmmakers frames the next shot knowing precisely how camera angles and lighting and pacing shape the emotional experience. So creativity isn't just randomness, it's mastery applied.

And the one big difference that humans do with this, is we don't just follow probabilities, we break them. We reach for the unexpected. We add noise, imperfection, and risk. We make mistakes that become discoveries.

And AI isn't just replacing creativity. It's forcing what's not replacing creativity. It's forcing us to define what creativity actually is.

Because if a machine can generate millions of variations of an idea, then the value is less about the act of making it, but more about the choices that we make and about what choices matter to us. And so that's why the fear isn't necessarily that AI will replace art. The fear is that it will flood the world with so much noise that we stop believing in the signal.

So let's look back a little bit back here. In the 80s, rock bands starting putting stickers on their albums saying, no synthetic instruments were used on the making of this record.

Why? Because drum machines and synthesizers were everywhere. And to some musicians, it wasn't just an aesthetic choice. It was a threat.

Similar but different challenge in hip hop. 1988, Public Enemy releases, it takes a nation of millions to hold us back.

And suddenly music wasn't just made of instruments anymore. It was built from fragments. James Brown's Horn Stab, a drum break from a forgotten funk record, a line from an old radio broadcast.

And then a year later, Beastie Boys do it too. Paul's Boutique, a sonic collage pulling together from disco, rock, jazz, movie soundtracks stitched together into something that felt both nostalgic and completely new.

And at first, no one knew how to fairly handle this form of creativity. Artists wanted to freely create while rights holders understandably wanted their recognition and fair compensation for their work. Standards and protections had to evolve.

Sounds familiar? Some of us say AI isn't real creativity.

Some say AI isn't real creativity because it's remixing, stealing, reassembling, learning. But it's sort of what creativity has always been. And the difference is AI isn't sampling records. It's sampling the entire history of recorded human creativity at once.

So what happens when a machine can replicate the exact shape of something without understanding its full context and place in the world? That's the conversation. Not many people want to have it.

We need to acknowledge the uncomfortable, tricky part in this creative part of it is the fact that a lot of people have already lost a lot of work to AI. We've had clients say they're experimenting with AI-generated options instead of hiring you, or seen budgets shrink because executives realized that they could cut costs by letting a machine approximate the shape of your work.

And I'm not going to stand here and pretend that this isn't happening. I'm not going to tell you that AI is just a tool and everything will be fine. And AI is a tool. but it's also a battleground for trust, for authenticity, for human voice and creativity.

And the danger isn't that AI replaces art, it's that it floods the world with so much content that nothing feels worth our attention anymore. And we already live in an era where everything is content, where an algorithm decides what you see, what you should listen to, what you should care about. And if that's the world we're moving towards, where AI can create infinite content tailored to individual preferences, optimized for maximum scrolling and minimum depth, then what happens to the things that actually matter?

What happens to the album that takes years to make? What happens to the film that doesn't fit into an algorithmic trend? What happens to the weird, imperfect, deeply human piece of art that doesn't check the right boxes but changes someone's life?

That's what's at stake. It's not whether AI can generate music. It's about whether we'll be able to hear the signal through the noise.

So let's imagine this scenario. Let's say AI automates everything. Would this be the end of human creativity?

No. Because no matter what AI takes off our plate, we'll always find something new to reach for.

When the drum machines arrived, did musicians stop making music? No. They made new kinds of music. We got Aphex Twin, and Timberland, and Trent Reznor, and a zillion other Devo.

When cameras were invented, did painters stop painting? No. They redefined what painting is. Do shop. Harold Gard, all these good guys, men and women making amazing art.

When computers took over calculations, did mathematicians stop thinking? Of course not. They started asking bigger, more complex questions. This is what we do. We create, we invent, we push against the edges of what's possible.

And also, people still make analog music. People still paint on canvases, and people still probably do a little bit of math on paper. And so those things aren't going to go away forever.

And it's important that we respect all of the stuff that led us here and understand it. And I feel like the cool thing with AI is it sort of brings those things together a little bit more. It gives everyone a little bit better understanding of where we're at. Even from the business side to the engineering side to the artist side, that's something that really, really I'm extremely excited about.

So it's what we do. Things rarely go away. And all those things that got us there are super important.

So we need to take a moment and remember. Think about this.

What was the most transformative, creative piece of content that changed your life in your book? Is there a book that changed how you see the world, a song that carried you through your most difficult days, or a film that made you sit in silence, unable to move after the credits rolled? That moment wasn't powerful because it was perfect. It was powerful because a human being made something that reached across time and space to touch something inside you.

And I don't believe in a future where AI replaces creativity. I believe in a future where AI forces us to evolve creativity, where it pushes us into new frontiers, new art forms, new ways of expression that have never existed before.

And see, every time a new creative technology emerges, the first thing people try and do is recreate the thing that already exists. When film was invented, they pointed the camera at a stage play. When television was invented, they filmed radio shows with faces. When digital music production became mainstream, a whole bunch of people tried to make it sound like analog instruments. And we're in that moment right now.

We're seeing AI being used to make cheaper versions of things that we already have, but that's not where it ends. AI is not like the tools that came before. It's not like a camera or a synthesizer or a computer program. It's more like language itself, a system that can be applied to almost anything that evolves with us, that shapes how we think while being shaped by us in return. We won't just be using AI to generate more of what exists. We'll be using it to create something that could have never existed before.

That's what we're building at DreamKey, not AI that pumps out endless variations of old ideas, but AI that enables real-time interactivity, audience-driven narratives, evolving characters, and something fundamentally new. We're not here to make faster content, although it's extremely fast, which is great. We're here to make an entirely new form of entertainment.

that next era of entertainment isn't just about what AI can create. It's what people trust.

And I put this on here because I wanted to show, I took all the text from this slide, and I was just like, oh, generate an image based on this text. And this is what it did. And a bunch of kind of random-y stuff with some text that doesn't really work.

And this is one of the many places where people in the creative world are going to be extremely useful for understanding that that's not going to resonate with people. The people who know how to do that have been years and years of creative work are going to be extremely valuable with this stuff. All these writers, all these artists and people who really know inside and out, they're going to be able to, of course, most people will spot this one.

But the next era of entertainment is not going to be about what AI can generate. It's about what people trust.

In the future, when the world is flooded by AI content, What will people actually care about? And I think the answer is simple. People will care about what feels real.

Not real as in this wasn't made by AI, but real as in this matters. This has a heartbeat. This has integrity. This wasn't made to manipulate me or waste my time.

Because people don't just want to consume content anymore. They want to be a part of it. They want to shape it. They want to participate. They crave actual community, quality content.

Not what an algorithm thinks they want, I mean, imagine a show where the characters remember you. The story evolves based on a collective audience decisions where you're not just watching, you're actively shaping the world as it unfolds.

This is the next art form in our opinion. This is what we're building. Not AI that replaces human creativity.

AI that enables entirely new ways to tell stories, build worlds, to create art that fights back against passive consumption. Art that demands that you engage in it. Art that responds to you. Art that isn't a product, but more of a relationship.

See, for decades, most powerful forces in entertainment weren't just the artists. They were the ones who controlled access. Record labels controlled who got heard. Studios controlled who got seen. Publishing houses controlled who got read.

And for the investors and business leaders in here, this is your opportunity, I think. The companies that will dominate in entertainment in the next decade aren't the ones with the best AI.

The companies that will succeed will be the ones that understand that AI is not just is changing not just how content is made, but how people relate to it.

The value isn't necessarily in the technology. It's in the relationship between them and the user.

We're not just building AI-powered content. We're building AI-powered experiences that demand real interaction, real participation, real engagement from audience, because this shouldn't be used to manipulate. It should be used to invite, to invite new audiences to something new, to invite them to explore, to play, engage with stories in ways that weren't possible before.

Because every time a new tool automates something that we once struggled with, it doesn't end human creativity. It forces us to find a new challenge, a new problem to solve, a new edge to explore, a new way to get pushed past through what we thought was possible.

New Challenges and Opportunities

No matter what AI automates, we'll always find new problems for ourselves. Not because we have to, because we want to.

Because we're not designed to sit back and accept what is given to us. We're designed to push forward, to experiment and break rules.

So that's why I don't really fear AI messing with the creative world. Because I know no matter how powerful it becomes, human creativity will always move beyond it.

Because creativity is not a product, it's a direction. And we will always be the ones choosing where it goes next.

And so to all the AI experts in the room, it's not here to replace art. We're here to demand something new from us. It's here to demand something new from us.

Right now, most of the AI-generated stuff, as far as content goes, is like a little derivative built on repetition and probability and past data. But the real breakthroughs we're going to get in this don't come from repeating the past. They come from someone asking questions that no one's asked before.

Not just to make faster content, not to generate cheap, disposable entertainment, not to mimic what already exists, but to create something that wasn't possible before. AI-powered interactivity, stories, characters that evolve in real time, audience-driven narratives, experiences that are truly alive.

This, in our opinion, is the future of storytelling. Because AI doesn't kill art. It's here to push art to places never imagined before.

And so for decades, entertainment has been designed to be passive. You sit, you watch, you consume. And a passive audience can be very predictable, and the predictable audience can be profitable.

But that model is starting to break down. People don't want to watch in the same way anymore. They want to engage. They want to shape. They want to participate. They want actual communal experiences where they can share with real people.

And this, we believe, is the future. And it's already happening.

Twitch streamers who interact with their audiences in real time, Fortnite concerts where millions of people exist in an event in real time. This is what AI unlocks, not just automation, but transformation.

And so to all the creators and artists in the room, your skill is not just making things, it's seeing what no one else can see and expressing that in ways no one would expect, feeling what is needed to be expressed. making connections that are not obvious.

And that skill in the future is going to be more valuable than ever. I can't replace that vision. It can give you new canvases to paint on, though.

And that's why we're building DreamKey, not as a tool to make cheaper, faster content, not as a machine that replaces human voices, but as a way to build the next art form. This is our opportunity to create something that isn't just seen but felt, something that doesn't exist but evolves.

And when I think about AI, I don't think about algorithms or neural networks or probability models. I like to think about the moments. I think about the first time a song hit me so hard that I had to stop what I was doing.

I like to think about the feeling of being in a crowd where all of us are singing the same words, the air electric strangers pulled into the same pulse of sound of meaning. I think about standing in front of a painting that somehow knew exactly how I felt, even though it was created centuries before I was born.

These moments don't happen by accident. They happen because someone made a choice, because an artist, a creator, someone decided that this mattered and that this was worth making.

The choices that we make now about how we use AI, about what we build, about what we amplify will define the future of creativity. This is why we're building DreamKey, to make sure that AI isn't just used to make more things, but to make sure that it's used to make better things.

Because the future of AI and entertainment isn't about replacing creativity. It's about amplifying the best of what it means to be human.

So we'll take it back to the water. I still sit by the water all the time, and we still look at those patterns. They emerge as I'm sitting there, and it's like, you know, thinking about the way nothing exists in isolation.

And 1the more I work with AI, the more I appreciate the complexity and beauty of the actual world that we live in. Not a world of perfect predictions, not a world of probability curves and generative models, but this world, the world where art isn't just made, it's felt. A world where a song doesn't just exist, it becomes a memory.

A world where stories don't just entertain us, they change us. And that's why we're building DreamKey, not just as a technology, not just as a company, but as a way to make something that has never existed before.

And this is our moment. This is your moment.

I'm asking each of you, whether you're an artist, someone who works in AI, an investor, a business owner, a startup, or someone who's uncertain about this entire field, what do you choose to amplify? What are you going to fight to preserve? What new thing will you help bring to the world?

Because if we do this right, if we take this opportunity and we push past the noise and demand that AI be used to elevate human creativity instead of replacing it, then we'll have done something greater than adapting to a new technology. We'll have created something worth remembering. And that choice is ours.