Artificial Intelligence, Marketing, Social Media
Samantha Sonnet
How Generative AI is Impacting Digital Marketing

Generative AI (GenAI) has become increasingly integrated into marketing and communication careers, and even our daily lives, with the rise of various text-to-image, text-to-video, & text-to-text tools. As digital marketers find new and innovative ways to keep up with the trends, and specifically GenZ in a quick-changing popular culture scene, how are they reacting to the rise of GenAI?

How Generative AI is Impacting Digital Marketing
Blockchain, Sustainability
Hannah Brainard
Blockchain Technology for Climate Action in the ...

Arts and cultural organizations are becoming increasingly aware of their climate impact, and many are taking action to reduce harm. Tracking, reporting, and offsetting emissions may seem like an overwhelming feat for small or mid-sized organizations, but emerging blockchain technology may help make the process more efficient and reliable. 

Blockchain Technology for Climate Action in the Arts
Advocacy, Arts & Technology, Laws & Legal, Social Media
AMT Lab Staff
TikTok — to Ban or Not to Ban

As previously foreshadowed by Samantha in an article written in July of 2023, TikTok: Opportunity and Risk, TikTok has been under a microscope from governments across the globe for quite awhile. The analysis provided in her article is still relevant today given the recent vote to ban TikTok, and the United States House moving forward to force Chinese state-owned TikTok company ByteDance to sell their ownership of the U.S. version of TikTok, or lose access to the United States TikTok market. To fully understand the situation, this article will recap TikTok’s controversial Privacy Policy and the 2023 testimonies, and also discuss the current governmental situation surrounding the ban. 

TikTok — to Ban or Not to Ban
Artificial Intelligence, Arts & Technology, Data, Digital Futures, Management
Brett Ashley Crawford, Ph.D.
Digital Strategy: Not Optional Anymore

Digital strategy has become a buzzword after the explosion of AI in the last 18 months. Yet, it is not about AI. AI has been the tipping point for organizations and professionals to recognize that they must update or create a digital strategy for success. Digitally-forward arts organizations already have a digital component as part of their strategic plan. Read more to understand the need for technology to be a core component of strategic plans and operations.

Digital Strategy: Not Optional Anymore
Social Media, entertainment
Hannah Brainard
March News: Privacy, Security, and Trust Busting

This month, the United States federal government is placing increased scrutiny on big tech regarding privacy, security, and market competition. While the Department of Justice files an antitrust suit against Apple for its hold on the smartphone market, Congress makes a bold statement with legislation potentially banning TikTok in the U.S.. Meanwhile, Reddit’s initial public offering may signal a move for tech companies to go public. In the world of entertainment, innovative tech brings scent to the gaming experience, and artists explore blockchain to compete with music streaming platforms.

March News: Privacy, Security, and Trust Busting

From Here to Awesome

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Democratizing Independent Film distribution

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From Here to Awesome I know that this festival has been around for a little over a year, but I still find myself visiting their homepage.

From Here to Awesome is presenting a new method of movie distribution that relies upon online viewer votes to decide which movies will be distributed.  The festival has no submission fees, the filmmakers retain all rights to their film and filmmakers make money directly.  This film festival is bypassing a lot of the industry gatekeepers to help distribute films that audiences want to see by using a simple online social platform.

I think that it is a really amazing way for independent filmmakers to get instant feedback from their audiences as well as to talk about some of the advances in the field that are creating higher production levels on lower budgets.

Filmmaker Fritz Donnelly, creator of the movie "To the Hills 2," describes the current state of the film making industry and points out many of the problems inherent in the system on From Here to Awesome's Festival Blog.  The Q&A session focuses on the possible technological utopia of film making and distribution of the future, and the hope that it brings.

This festival seems to have been a great success, considering that by July 26th, the festival's 22 selected showcase films will be available online on Amazon, Vudu, Netflix, IndieFlix.com, Hereticfilms.com, Hulu, Joost, Cacchi, and Vuze.  Recent theatrical screenings have also taken place in San Francisco, Boston, and London, as well as over 25 guerrilla drive-in screening events.

I can see that the future of independent and documentary film distribution will have the tendancy to become more democratized as festivals like From Here to Awesome create more of an online marketplace, and the costs of quality production start to come down.  The prices of cameras and editing software are reaching a point where they are accessable to more and more people with a story to tell.