What better way to promote one AI feature than with another? That seems to be the line of thinking over at Google after the tech giant released an AI-generated ad about AI-powered search functionality.
In its first-ever ad that was fully generated by its Veo 3 AI video platform, the company shows a turkey named Tom helping people plan for holiday travel with AI Mode in Google Search. After being given a prompt for “I need to go somewhere with direct flights and NO Thanksgiving” that’s “leaving tomorrow,” Tom is given destinations that don’t celebrate Thanksgiving, like Aruba and Cancún, each of which have their own short description.
While the ad itself clearly has that uncanny AI sheen, there isn’t any explicit mention that it was made using Veo 3. Instead, the video just has a standard disclosure that it contains “altered or synthetic content.”
That was the point, as Robert Wong, the co-founder and a vice president of Google’s Creative Lab marketing team, told The Wall Street Journal. He confirmed that the ad was produced in Veo 3, but said this wasn’t mentioned in the video because people “don’t care” whether an ad was generated by AI.
But while Wong says the company will continue to roll out these AI-generated advertisements, he adds that it doesn’t plan to make every ad with Veo 3 — at least, not yet. As Wong predicted to WSJ, these ads will become more common as AI becomes a more ubiquitous tool like Photoshop.
That said, Wong didn’t address the long-running concerns about generative AI stealing content from other people, be it individual artists or companies’ intellectual properties. While Google will no doubt say it’s worked to ensure that wouldn’t happen, it isn’t something that can be guaranteed.
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