Fake, AI-generated videos about the Diddy trial are raking in millions of views on YouTube

The Guardian

3 days ago

This story was reported by Indicator, a publication that investigates digital deception, and co-published with the Guardian.
Dozens of YouTube channels are mixing AI-generated images and videos with false claims about Sean 'Diddy' Combs's blockbuster trial to pull in tens of millions of views on YouTube and cash in on misinformation.
Twenty-six channels generated nearly 70m views from roughly 900 AI-infused Diddy videos over the past 12 months, according to data gathered from YouTube.
The channels appear to follow a similar formula. Each video typically has a title and AI-generated thumbnail that links a celebrity to Diddy via a false claim, such as that the celebrity just testified at the trial, that Diddy coerced that celebrity into a sexual act or that the celeb shared a shocking revelation about Diddy. The thumbnails often depict the celebrity on the stand juxtaposed with an image of Diddy. Some depict Diddy and the celebrity in a compromising situation. The vast majority of thumbnails use made-up quotes meant to shock people, such as 'F*CKED ME FOR 16 HOURS', 'DIDDY F*CKED BIEBER LIFE' and 'SHE SOLD HIM TO DIDDY'.
Some of the channels going all-in on Diddy 'slop', a term that refers to low-quality media generated by artificial intelligence, have a history of making false claims about celebrities and of using AI-generated thumbnails. But most of the 26 channels appear to be either newly created or older channels that were repurposed. At least 20 channels were eligible to earn revenue from ads.
False and sensationalized Diddy AI slop is an easy way to make money on YouTube right now, according to Wanner Aarts, who runs dozens of YouTube channels with AI-generated content and sells a course about how to make money on the platform. He said he's not personally cashing in on the Diddy trend.
'If you would say, 'Hey, how can I make $50,000 as soon as possible?' Number one would be like doing fucking drug [dealing], but number two would probably be to start a Diddy channel,' said Aarts, 25.
Indicator reviewed hundreds of thumbnails and titles with false claims about Brad Pitt, Will Smith, Justin Bieber, Oprah Winfrey, Eddie Murphy, Leonardo DiCaprio, Dwayne 'the Rock' Johnson, 50 Cent, Joe Rogan and others. Strangely, one channel, Fame Fuel, posted 20 consecutive videos with AI-generated thumbnails and titles that make false claims about the US attorney general, Pam Bondi, and Diddy.
One of the most successful channels is Peeper, which has over 74m views since being created in 2010, but has focused only on Diddy for at least eight months. Peeper has many of the most viral Diddy videos among the top misinformers, including a video with the false title 'Justin Bieber Exposes Will Smith, Diddy, and Clive Davis for Grooming Him'. It received 2.3m views. Peeper has now been demonetized.
A channel called Secret Story switched to Diddy content after posting health and life advice in Vietnamese. Hero Story pivoted to Diddy after initially uploading videos about Ibrahim Traoré, the military ruler of Burkina Faso. A Brazilian channel that generated millions of views from embroidery videos switched to Diddy less than two weeks ago. And a channel called Celeb Buzz generated more than 1m views from 11 Diddy videos in less than three weeks. It was created in early 2018 but appears to have removed any previously uploaded videos. Secret Story and Hero Story were terminated by YouTube after inquiries from Indicator; Celeb Buzz was demonetized.
In another example, roughly three weeks ago, the channel Pak Gov Update started uploading videos about Diddy that use AI-generated thumbnails with false quotes attributed to celebrities such as Usher and Jay-Z. One video is titled 'Jay-Z Breaks His Silence on Diddy Controversy' and features a thumbnail of Jay-Z crying and holding up a CD above the quote 'I WILL BE DEAD SOON'.
The nearly 30-minute video, which uses clips from TV news and other sources and AI-generated narration, has 113,000 views. It does not contain any new information from Jay-Z, and the rapper never said the quote that is attributed to him.
Pak Gov Update previously posted short, amateurish videos with clickbait titles about public pensions in Pakistan. Its biggest hit was a video called Big information! Senior Citizen Pension Scheme || fedaral Cabnet Big Development, which received a relatively modest 18,000 views. (Typos theirs.)
Aarts said that the Diddy slop strategy is lucrative but risky. 'Most of these channels aren't going to survive,' he said, citing the likelihood of getting demonetized due to YouTube policy violations, or legal action from Diddy and other celebrities featured in thumbnails and videos.
As with Pak Gov Update, most of the videos uploaded by the channels use AI-generated narration over real clips from news reports and other sources. Some also use AI images and, less frequently, synthetic video. The channels' use of real footage often appears to test the boundaries of fair use.
AI slop is just one type of content that you can find about the Diddy trial on YouTube. But it appears to be a growing and lucrative niche. Similar Diddy AI content is also racking up engagement on TikTok.
YouTube spokesperson Jack Malon said in an email: 'We terminated several channels shared by Indicator for violating our terms of service and policies covering spam.' Malon said the company removed 16 channels, including Fame Fuel. YouTube also appears to have demonetized several channels, such as Pak Gov Update.
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The Diddy craze is the result of two intertwined trends in YouTube hustling: automation and faceless channels.
YouTube automation hinges on the idea that anyone can build a successful YouTube business with the right niche and a low-cost video creation process. Just find a topic that people want to watch videos about, brainstorm ideas and hire overseas editors to pump out content at a nearly automated pace.
Thanks to AI, it's easier than ever to pursue the dream of faceless automation. Aarts said that anyone can create a script with ChatGPT or another large language model, generate images and thumbnails with Midjourney or similar models, use Google Veo 3 for video, and finish the process with a tool like ElevenLabs to create an AI voiceover. Then hire freelancers in the Philippines or elsewhere to edit the video, he said.
'AI has opened up a lot more for people with lower budgets to enter YouTube automation,' Aarts said, noting that it's possible to pay less than $10 per video. He said he earns more than $130,000 month from more than 45 channels.
Muhammad Salman Abazai, who runs AS Venturer, a Pakistani company that provides video editing and YouTube channel management services, said that Diddy videos have become a 'proper niche' on YouTube. Abazai showed off a few Diddy videos that his team created and uploaded to a luxury/wealth channel they run for a client.
'It was a success for us because we got a lot of boost from that, we got subscribers from this,' he said.
The pivot to Diddy doesn't just work in English. A Spanish-language channel called NV Historia launched in January and had seen sporadic success with completely AI-generated videos about celebrities. Its first hit was a video with a title that translates to 'A teacher laughs at a Black girl for saying her father is Chuck Norris – until he walks into the classroom'. It received just over 140,000 views.
NV Historia pumped out Chuck Norris slop until views began to taper off about a month ago. That's when the channel uploaded its first Diddy video. Its title translates to '1 MINUTE AGO: Nobody expected Dwayne Johnson to say THIS in court about Diddy … ' The thumbnail uses AI-generated images of the Rock and Diddy in court, as well as an image of the former wrestler being forced to eat what appears to be a brain. The thumbnail features the quote 'He forced me to eat it.'
Johnson has not testified and is not linked to any of Diddy's alleged illegal activities. The video has received more than 200,000 views. NV Historia posted a video falsely linking Oprah Winfrey and other celebrities to Diddy the next day, earning 45,000 views. It went all in on Diddy content after that. YouTube has since demonetized NV Historia.
A French-language channel, StarBuzzFR, launched in May and appears to only upload Diddy content. It uses AI-generated thumbnails and voiceovers to spin false stories, including that Brad Pitt testified against Diddy and said that he was sexually abused by the mogul. StarBuzzFR is particularly fond of using AI-generated, sexualized images of Diddy and celebs like Pitt. The channel is still monetized as of this writing.
Aarts said the general attitude among the YouTube faceless/automation community is that anyone who can figure out a way to make money deserves respect.
'I have nothing to say other than congratulations to those people that are able to pull something like it off,' he said.