Netflix again criticized for using AI in documentary

Dirty Pop: The impresario is a crook, recently arrived on the platform, is in the spotlight. But not for the right reasons.

Here we go again for the platform. Last April, the streaming giant had already been caught in the act of shameless use of artificial intelligence in a true crime dedicated to the Jennifer Pan case (Jennifer's Truths). This time it's the documentary Dirty Pop: The impresario is a crook (Dirty Pop: The Boy Band Scam in original version)which attracts the wrath of an enlightened public, nevertheless present because the documentary ranked first in the US ranking of the platform in a few days.

Released on July 24 on Netflix, it looks back at the life of Lou Pearlmancreator of many boy bands in the 1990s (the Backstreet Boys and *NSYNC in particular), and a first-rate crook according to some of his closest collaborators. In 2008, he was sentenced to twenty-five years in prison for having been the initiator of a Ponzi pyramid through which he encouraged individuals, banks and even relatives to invest in shell companies.

Mini-series of three episodes, Dirty Pop takes a detailed look at the ups and downs of Lou Pearlman's career, as we can see and hear him tell his story. But here's the thing: the man in question has been dead and buried since August 2016. In other words, his voice and part of his appearance have been reconstructed by artificial intelligence.

The use of AI is indicated from the beginning of this triptych. Images “were digitally altered to generate her voice and lip sync,” indicates the introductory sequence. The problem is that these fabricated images are still lost among real archive images, themselves passing for documents with historical, documentary and even journalistic value.

And then above all, a major criticism found on social networks: they quickly make people feel uncomfortable.

Yet AI is an aspect of the documentary that its producers have enthusiastically developed, advocating technological advancement above all else. On the occasion of Netflix's TUDUM, Michael Johnson explained:

“Above all, we wanted to use this new technology in the most ethical way possible, as an additional storytelling tool, not a replacement for it in any way. We secured the rights to Lou’s life; we used only words written by Lou himself; we hired an actor to speak those words; we used real footage of Lou to capture his true mannerisms and body language; and we hired AI experts from MIT Media Lab, Pinscreen, and Resemble AI to implement our vision.”

For the showrunners, these images were “essential to understanding Lou as a human being as well as a crook”.

If we can understand their initial intentions, the use of artificial intelligence in content that bears the name of “documentary” remains an ethical faux pas for many. The road to hell is paved with bad intentions, and that's what Internet users say: “I like the documentary Dirty Pop but Lou Pearlman's AI freaks me out, you could have hired a voice actor and an animator and done something MUCH less disruptive”or : “To whoever decided to make Lou Pearlman an AI narrator of the documentary Dirty Pop on Netflix, I hope you step on a Lego. It's a shame”we can read on X.