There is a serendipitous link between Generation Z and artificial intelligence, says AKQA
Generation Z will drive the age of leisure and passion, a phenomenon being accelerated by artificial intelligence, according to executive creative director of AKQA Shanghai, Eric Cruz.
Speaking at Adfest in Thailand, Cruz explored what creativity meant in the age of the ‘superhuman’, stating that a serendipitous crossover was about to happen that would herald in an age of leisure and passion, rather than work.
Firstly, he looked at the proliferation of artificial intelligence and the inevitability of robots taking on tasks that humans do in our working lives.
He looked at marketing industry roles and said that the likes of Squarespace and Wix rendered the role of the digital web designed almost redundant in 2015. He said that by 2020 the same would be said for social media managers. “Digital natives know what social is. There will be no need for management as it will be automated because it is built into who they are,” said Cruz.
The age of passion and leisure, in which people make money and exist by following their hobbies and likes, however, is only truly realised when Generation Z grow up. He says this is because people who grew up in the 90s onwards also crossed over with the trend of telling people to “follow your passions”.
“The passion generation will rule in 10 years and they will power the passion and leisure economy,” he added.
He cited the growth of the YouTuber and both professional sports and e-sports players as being the first signs of this crossover emerging.
In the passion and leisure age, where AI takes on some of the more physical and systematic work, Cruz believes it will also spawn a new creative class. He compared the Japan Feudal system (below) to the modern day, suggesting that in an age when more military needs were the focus, creative skills were deemed less important.
This is is now the opposite and in the future (below), in the age of leisure and passion, even more so.
