Good morning, baseball fans!
Earlier this week, the San Francisco Giants announced that they would be working with ElevenLabs, an AI research and product company, in an upcoming multi-year partnership at Oracle Park.
ElevenLabs will become the presenting sponsor of Oracle Park’s Championship Suite. They will also “deploy AI voice and audio technology throughout the ballpark to elevate the fan experience.”
Thanks, I hate it.
I’m sure there are good or even neutral uses for AI technology, such as accessibility
in the form of translation services and audio dubbing, as the announcement mentions in further detail.
But in my experience on an everyday use basis, AI features tend to be forced on the public, filled with data-mining functions to steal as much user information as possible, and lack the ability to turn them off. Meanwhile, those features tend to primarily slow down programs (often ones that users have already paid for) and make it take ten times longer to do the things they were already doing with those programs before. But that’s just my opinion.
Anyway, the announcement goes on to read like a word-soup scramble of corporate buzzwords:
“Through this integration, the organization will elevate fan engagement and optimize operations across several key areas, including real-time, AI-powered fan support for ticketing, merchandise, food ordering, and ballpark FAQs, as well as in-game activations featuring live dubbing and multilingual audio at Oracle Park.”
Sounds to me like a lot of people at Oracle Park are going to lose their jobs whenever this actually goes into effect. But yay optimized operations I guess. Because that’s what the world needs more of right now.
What time do the Giants play today?
The Giants wrap up this series against the Philadelphia Phillies today at 12:45 p.m. PT.
