[Session 1] City, Design and AI
Session 1 "City, Design and AI" Sang Lee (Creative Director of Tik Tok) |
[Sang Lee]
Today's presentation topic is 'Urban Design and Artificial Intelligence'. Since it's not too difficult a topic, I hope you can listen comfortably. I am currently a Creative Director at TikTok, working on AI system implementation. Before that, I was a Design Director at Google, and prior to that, I was the head of C+ AI Plon Studio at Microsoft. Before that, I worked at LYIN Digital. This year, I wrote a book called 'AI Works, Humans Grow' which fortunately became a bestseller. Thank you.
Cities Shaping People
What does a city mean to me? Of course, a city is where we live, where economic activities take place, and a space that provides inspiration. Beyond these, cities have various purposes and functions, and the combination of these elements shapes the people who live in them. I am no exception.
Living in Seoul for 25 years, I experienced a dynamic and competitive environment. Later, working as a designer in New York for 10 years helped establish my identity as a designer. In New York, I also had the opportunity to establish Deloitte's design team's New York office. Afterwards, I moved to Seattle to work with a big tech company for the first time at Microsoft. Later, when I moved to Google in Silicon Valley, I gained great insights working at a global company that impacted not millions, but billions of people.
AI’s Rapid Development and Its Impact on Design
The two elements that define me today are design and AI. AI, especially Generative AI, has made remarkable progress in recent years. It has grown rapidly over the past 4-5 years, and I have grown alongside it. One of the design tools we use is 'MidJourney', which generates images from text. Looking at the pace of this tool's development shows how quickly AI has evolved. In 2024, MidJourney version 6 has become commercially available to provide products to the public, and version 7 will be released soon. Not only text-to-image generation but also text-to-video technology has rapidly developed and is already being used commercially. Coca-Cola's seasonal advertisements have also used these AI tools. AI's advancement is not limited to just image or video generation but is being applied across all areas, from Nvidia's technological developments to cloud-based language models and API operations.
AI and Urban Design Transformation
Self-driving cars and autonomous taxis are becoming increasingly common. However, what's important is not simply the technology itself, but how this technology changes the urban landscape. As self-driving cars and robots are increasingly introduced, the city as we know it today will change. Today's cities face problems such as parking space shortages and traffic congestion. Autonomous driving technology can solve some of these problems and transform current urban infrastructure. Generative AI helps us visualize our imagination. For example, a Twitter user imagined reconstructing Philadelphia's highway into a park using AI tools. The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) applied a similar approach in Panama City. Students from Panama's Technical University worked with local residents using AI tools to visually redesign their communities. Through this technology, they were able to visually express ideas and create concrete roadmaps for urban planning discussions.
Conclusion: Technology Is Just a Tool
Technology is just a tool. When the commercial camera was first invented in 1839, people feared that photography would diminish the value of art, distort truth, and take away jobs. However, that didn't happen. Instead, photography inspired artistic movements like Impressionism and Cubism, completely redefining art. Similarly, AI will expand creative possibilities and will not replace human creativity.
As Bruce Lee said, 'Be water, my friend.' We need to be adaptable, open, and embrace technology with courage.
Thank you.
