While technological development is always welcomed and celebrated, it can put people out of jobs. There was a time when every single frame was hand-drawn to make animation. With time, development allowed for cheaper, faster, and more efficient work. While this has largely reduced production costs and manpower, there are fears of man-made technologies putting people out of work.

In modern times, AI has been one such technology that can be considered a modern wonder. It has already found its way into Netflix, but a recent usage in Netflix Japan has left fans as well as creative people in concern. There is a good reason behind it as well.

Why are fans upset over the use of AI in Dog and The Boy?

Netflix’s new anime short film Dog and The Boy is undoubtedly a sweet and heartwarming story. But the making of the movie has raised some eyebrows. As per Creative Bloq, Netflix Japan took to Twitter to announce how they used AI to make the short film. While they seemed proud of announcing the show, it has not settled well with fans who highly criticized the makers of the show. The reason that AI has been controversial is the fact that they tend to put people out of work. To add to it, AI also allows people to pay creatives a lesser amount.

While Netflix promoted the usage of AI as a way to help anime makers, fans seem to think otherwise. Initially, the use of AI was limited to making social media posts and people experimenting. But all the background images were apparently made with the use of AI.

https://twitter.com/sonicmega/status/1620562061632901121?s=20&t=W9QND0sjqaW5f82Rw2InUQ

https://twitter.com/mincrftclar112/status/1620558343902461952?s=20&t=W9QND0sjqaW5f82Rw2InUQ

The makers tried to promote that the anime industry had a labor shortage. “As an experimental effort to help the anime industry, which has a labor shortage, we used image generation technology for the background images of all three-minute video cuts!” read the caption of the tweet. People criticized this explanation by claiming that there are plenty of anime creators looking for jobs.

Fans even called out the fact that the one person who helped make the AI background did not even get credit. The person was simply referred to as +human in the credits. The biggest irony in all of this is perhaps the fact that the movie is about dreams, ambition, and emotions, while it is made using a machine.

What do you think about the criticism that Dog and The Boy is facing? Comment your thoughts.