Google Pulls AI Olympics Ad Featuring Major Track Star After Backlash
By Movieguide® Contributor
Google has pulled a recent Olympics-themed ad for its Gemini AI tech following major backlash.
The reason for the public outcry? The commercial, titled “Dear Sydney,” features a father encouraging his daughter to use A.I. to write a letter to her favorite athlete, U.S. hurdler and sprinter Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone.
“Gemini, help my daughter write a letter telling Sydney how inspiring she is,” the father says in the ad, with shots of the draft the AI tech helps his daughter create.
The commercial quickly received criticism, with many people frustrated that Google would encourage parents to have their kids use AI to write a letter instead of being creative on their own.
“A parent’s most important job is to educate their children,” Shelly Palmer, a professor of advanced media at Syracuse University’s S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, wrote in a popular blog post.
Palmer continued, “The father in the video is not encouraging his daughter to learn to express herself. Instead of guiding her to use her own words and communicate authentically, he is teaching her to rely on AI for this critical human skill.”
Washington Post staffer Alexandra Petri also shared her concerns about the ad in an op-ed, writing, “All of the buffoons excited by the prospect of A.I. taking over all our writing — report summaries, data surveys, children’s letters, all tossed into the same pile indiscriminately — are missing the point in a spectacular manner. To take away the ability to write for yourself is to take away the ability to think for yourself.”
A Google spokesperson told Deadline, “While the ad tested well before airing, given the feedback, we have decided to phase the ad out of our Olympics rotation.”
Google also released a statement about the ad, saying, “We believe that AI can be a great tool for enhancing human creativity, but can never replace it. Our goal was to create an authentic story celebrating Team USA. It showcases a real-life track enthusiast and her father, and aims to show how the Gemini app can provide a starting point, thought starter, or early draft for someone looking for ideas for their writing.”
Movieguide® previously reported on the spread of AI:
A recent study found that using artificial intelligence is becoming commonplace among U.S. adults.
A 2022 survey from Pew Research found that “a larger share of Americans say they are ‘more concerned than excited’ by the increased use of AI in daily life than say the opposite.”
However, despite limited enthusiasm for the tech a few years ago, Barna Group and Gloo found that “31 percent of U.S. adults say they use AI weekly or daily. Millennials have become especially frequent adopters, with 43 percent of them using AI at least weekly.”
Young adults are more likely to use AI compared to older adults.
Per Barna, “Millennials and Gen Z use AI most frequently in their personal lives, with over half (54%) of both groups using the technology ‘often’ or ‘sometimes.’ Meanwhile, older generations are far less likely to embrace AI (82% of Boomers and 91% of Elders say they use AI ‘not very much’ or ‘not at all’).”
Systems like ChatGPT, Siri, Alexa and others make it even easier to implement AI into daily life. Many find themselves using the tech to get answers to questions like, “How many points did Michael Jordan have in his career?”
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