J[AI]ke From State Farm

In support of the AI Spokesperson/Concierge/Expert

Or: There’s a Bigger Bag to be Had.

Like seemingly everyone these days, I’m part of a couple of weekly calls where we discuss creative technology and our changing roles and workflows. More often than not, those discussions include the creative pipeline and and use case extrapolations for AI talent/influencers/experts. And more often than not, we seem to circle back to the potential for a “Jake From State Farm” AI.

That may sound like a nonsequitur. Why Jake from State Farm?

And to that, I answer: “Why not Jake from State Farm?” I think the reason we always seem to reference this specific example is because Jake from State Farm is an obvious/perfect candidate for AI duplication and licensing.

Jake from State Farm is an instantly recognizable fictional character. He has an established affability. He is the wholly-owned and dedicated IP of the brand he represents and can be used in any capacity they please. And he is tied (almost) inexorably to the actor who portrays him.

That last part is important. It’s important because, in the buzz of technological advancement, we should always keep in mind that advertising, like its more fun cousin entertainment, usually relies on the collaboration of several creatives and should be an opportunity for those creatives (in this case we’ll focus on an actor) to build equity and receive participation for their work on the product.

I think this is common knowledge, but it’s worth stating: For the few actors who are lucky enough to land longterm spokesperson roles with telecoms, insurance companies, pharma companies, financial services companis, etc. the rewards and role stability are ridiculously lucrative. They make incredible money, the characters they portray are, by design, universally likable and non-controversial, and the entire game plan for this type of campaign is to run it for as long as possible and to build trust in the character by using the same actor for the span of a career. (For the sake of disambiguation, what we’re discussing here are actors portraying spokespeople, rather than the celebrity spokesperson…read to the end for my take on that)

Awesome gig if you can get it. But, to be fair, there is also a cap and a shelf life to a spokes-actor’s earnings. Eventually, the actor will age out of the persona, or retire, or run their course and switch to a competitor. And I think, with all of the new tools at our disposal, there’s potential for a longer and deeper trajectory. In short, we can now build a spokesperson that is omnipresent, and operationally integrated for the life of a product. We can build JAIke.

HE’S MORE MACHINE NOW THAN MAN

The closest entertainment analog that comes to mind would probably be the James Earl Jones example. Last year, when Jones announced that, after 45 years, he was considering winding down his work as Darth Vader, there was a decision to be made. Darth Vader could be voiced in the future by a different actor, OR the next several generations of Star Wars films, shows, games, attractions, etc. could go with the sure bet and continue to use Jones’ voice. And because Disney had he resources, they made the best choice and did just that. James Earl Jones licensed his voice, style, patterns and archival performance to Disney so that they could create an AI voice actor to take over as Darth Vader.

To me, this is the gold star example. Vader is not just A franchise character, he is THE franchise character. Vader transcends any individual piece of media. He’s mythical. He’s an almost religious villain. A lot of that has to do with the voice of James Earl Jones, and I would not want to mess with that formula. It ain’t broke.

In addition to being strategically sound, the JAImes Earl Jones replication was also tactically well-founded. The training team had not only the cooperation of the actor, but also access to 45 years of archived voice recordings, spanning countless productions and VO session at their disposal. It was a layup for Disney and, I think, it was a layup for James Earl Jones and his family.

Because that’s how generational wealth is generated and maintained. If actors are paid to show up and perform, and technology allows them to show up and perform everywhere and forever, there is clearly a bigger bag to be had.

Side note: yes, it is incredibly poetic that the actor who plays a sci-fi villain who is most notable for rebuilding himself as a machine has now rebuilt himself as a machine. Life imitates art.

ANYWAY.

Why couldn’t Kevin Miles (the actor who portrays Jake From State Farm…technically Jake from State Farm 2.0) do the same thing? Of course, we all realize that Jake from State Farm is not a character in the same way that DARTH F’N VADER is a character, but in his niche, he’s equally as valuable.

Jake from State Farm is a household name. He is universally liked. He has an active, engaged second life on social media. He gets discussed, mid-game by NFL commentators. He appears in NBA 2K22. He even does IRL character appearances and hangs out with Jason Kelce’s mom. Hell, he could do your kids birthday party if you have an adorably nerdy kid who’s really into insurance. He’s a legit character.

VIL DEALS

I guess we could think of this sort of an arrangelment, if and when it becomes common, as a VIL deal. Voice, Image and Likeness. Although the actor doesn’t own the IP to control the character he plays, the actor is, in this case, an essential piece of the character’s persona.

And the benefit here would be not only to the actor, but also to the company. In this example, J[AI]ke (not a person) can do everything, everywhere, all at once. This means that the Jake AI with which State Farm’s customer is engaging in ads and top-of-funnel activities can accompany that customer as a sales rep, advocate and CS agent throughout their consumer lifespan.

Problem with your coverage? Have a claim question? Feel like no one is giving you straight answers?

You know what. I’ma just hop on the chat with my man Jake. He always knows this insurance stuff.

HE’S GOT YOU COVERED.

As The Bard once pondered (super philosophical tone here), what are actors, if not the original AI? Trained to mimic, develop, and make decisions as a completely separate, sentient (but ultimately imaginary) entity, based only on a finite script and a limited data set for research.

That is a lie. Shakespeare never pondered that. The point, however, is that he probably would have. I KNOW Jake From State Farm isn’t a real person. I know he is a character being portrayed by an actor. But do I care? Not one iota. And I think the same can be said for any decent AI engine playing the role of an expert, worker, assistant, marketer, etc. If it has a good data set to pull from, has a good track record, is pleasant to interact with, and has earned my trust, it can be an actor, a robot, a call-center employee, an alien, a cyborg, a community leader, a neighbor, a recording…doesn’t matter.

And this “not mattering” is why I think that fictional characters, the same types of characters who voice our GPS, sell us sugary cereal and hamburgers, remind us to go to the doctor, prevent forest fires, or report crimes, are not only the past, but the future of the influencer/expert/spokesperson industry.

Those of us who create characters for a living should be stoked, because today, we can look to a future where creatives can earn a living without having a parent or sugarparent in Hollywood or having to get naked on the internet, or having to participate in not-very-good dance trends starting from an alarmingly young age.

And those of us who work as actors, hosts, or other performing talent have the opportunity to create something timeless, monetize our performances scalably, and potentially find a new sense of agency. It also means that those actors lucky enough to land a spokesperson role might have a more viable exit trajectory that would allow them to play parts outside of their exclusivity and conduct agreements (but that part’s for the lawyers).

To bring it back to the other side of the table: There is one more distinct and obvious corporate advantage to using AI influencers. Simply put, humans are messy. And I can tell you, anecdotally, after 20 years in this industry, that people who identify as social media creators or influencers are super extra messy. I don’t know if it’s the chicken or the egg with social media talent, but there is a noticably higher rate of broken-ness (very technical term there) in our industry. It attracts, nurtures, and maybe creates individuals with a piece or two missing. But fictional characters aren’t messy. There is a prerequisite understanding with regards to fictional characters that they don’t do bad human stuff. Even if the actor who portrays a character does bad human stuff, those two entities are ultimately separate and distinct. So, in the long run, even if your fictional character has to be divorced from the actor portraying it, that divorce is far less messy than having to scrap a spokesperson altogether because they have proven untrustworthy, legally vulnerable or just all around awful. And this is especially true for sensitive categories like insurance, pharma, finance, tech, etc. where the rules around influence are particularly strict.

Which, as a parting thought, makes me wonder what the hell Meta is doing with their AI chat experts? Using existing, non-actor celebrities with pseudonyms as chatbots, IMHO, lives in the uncanny valley of cringe. The Meta experts are real public figures (not characters or personas), with all of their accompanying baggage, checking in under an assumed name. The whole thing feels like the right mechanics moving in the wrong direction and not catching the ball. It looks like a rich folks, echo-chamber execution of an otherwise very viable concept. It plays to the tune of no one daring to say “dude. no.” to a billionaire. It smells like a secret data room where “tactical peasant manipulation” is discussed. Even the celebrity choices are a little questionable. if you asked me to off-top a list of things that people don’t trust, it would probably include Meta, the Kardashians, and Tom Brady pretty close to the top. Only a human could’ve cooked up something so chaotic 😂

But, of course, the bigger picture may be much brighter. This could be Meta’s awkward first step in the rollout of personalized AI Assistants for every business account. Maybe. Probably not but maybe. OK Definitely not.