Like most companies in today’s “maximize revenue no matter what” business world, WWE is looking into how they can utilize artificial intelligence technology into their processes and product.
As one of a rapidly decreasing numbers of human beings paid to write things on the internet, I have A LOT of thoughts about AI (many of which were formed during the late 90s/early 2000s internet boom in a previous tech marketing career, and just living through the rise and enshittification of social media over
the past 20ish years). Other than a quick mention of how horrible it is for both the earth and our tenuous power grid, in order to stay relatively on topic though, I’ll just point you to some well-sourced writings on the subject from the man who came up with the term “enshittifcation”, Cory Doctorow: like “AI’s Productivity Theater”, “AI can’t do your job”, and and his most recent, “The real (economic) AI apolocalypse is nigh”. *
Regarding WWE’s plans for AI…
Last month, a new Senior Director of Creative Strategy was introduced to the WWE creative team by Chief Content Officer Paul “Triple H” Levesque. Cyrus Kowsari got the job after spending 2016-2022 at Buzzfeed as a producer, and then joining MMA promotion ONE, where he stayed from 2022 until WWE hired him. Per the latest Wrestling Observer Newsletter, Triple H told his team that Kowsari was there to integrate AI into creative services like video and graphics, but also into WWE’s storytelling. A Dave Meltzer source claims the CCO said that a shift to using AI is “inevitable when it comes to creative in pro wrestling”.
WWE has apparently already partnered with a company called Writer AI (excuse me while my urge to vomit passes), and is in the process of training its systems on WWE content. If you’ve played around with AI tools — and despite my general negativity, there are lots of interesting uses and hopeful applications for the targeted use of the tech — you know that some of things it doesn’t handle well are humor and especially sarcasm, so you can imagine how well it did at creating something for an artform based on lies, about other lies, on top of even more lies.
A WON source said the AI-generated creative was “absurdly bad”. They gave the example of a program it generated for AEW’s Bobby Lashley, who it mistakenly thought was still with WWE. It called for Lashley to play a character “obsessed with Japanese culture and history”.
In the AI’s defense, maybe it had just watched this and figured anything would be a step up…
(Yes, that’s The Acclaimed’s Max Caster as Lashley sister #2)
WWE is determined to plow ahead with their AI efforts, however. A WON source said the internal feeling is “once bugs are worked out… AI will begin to have major impact on storyline direction”. Meltzer also writes that another promotion experimented with AI for generating creative, or even just ideas, and “and found it couldn’t understand pro wrestling and storylines”.
Perhaps they’ll get the kinks worked out, and the machines will one day give us kayfabe. Or maybe the weird, wacky, wonderful world of pro wrestling is just something that’s only meant for us weird, wacky, wonderful human beings to create and enjoy?
We’ll close things out with a word from someone who probably thinks about the world about as much as Doctorow, and definitely thinks more about pro wrestling than his fellow Canadian. And hey, given the timing of Kowsari’s WWE hiring and his introduction to the team, Sami Zayn’s post might be more than just a passing thought…
* This is the kind of paragraph I’d normally footnote, but I really want people to know how dumb and bad this blanket AI push we’re being sold is.
