New names for old interests: artificial intelligence and the reconfiguration of creative labor in contemporary capitalism

Abstract

Abstract This essay critically analyzes how the emergence of artificial intelligence (AI) reconfigures the labor process of content producers. The study is based on a narrative review of the literature on the aforementioned topics, from which two analytical axes are proposed. In the first, we demonstrate that AI cannot be understood merely as a tool to support creative activities, but rather as a new technical basis that expands the possibilities for the capitalist appropriation of creative labor. In the second, we analyze how the incorporation of AI into the work of content producers intensifies processes of standardization, algorithmic control, and alienation. It is argued that the diffusion of generative AI expands the mechanisms for the rationalization and control of creative labor, creating conditions for the intensification of production and the redefinition of the role of workers in content production.