The Suspicious Eye: Rituals of Image Checking in the Age of Image Generative Technologies

The integration of automation into culture has a rich and long history. In 2004, for instance, the now-defunct company Hewlett Packard introduced the first camera with a red-eye removal function to automatically—i.e., without user intervention—eliminate the annoying appearance of red-eye common in many photographs until the mid-2000s. Although useful, such automation has almost completely gone unnoticed by many. However, the recent arrival of "intelligent" forms of automation—AI—on many devices brought new possibilities and established new rituals and habits. Generative AI tools for the production of images, for instance, have triggered the emergence of new checking rituals with individuals, routinely scrutinising images on their phones, enlarging them and leaning in towards their screen in a bid to detect imperfections that might betray an image's artificial origins. While this case is representative of larger shifts, the socio-cultural significance of "intelligent" automation for the generation and dissemination of daily content is establishing novel practices, habits, rituals, and beliefs with profound implications. This brief text aims to explore the everyday, commonplace, absurd and seemingly banal rituals brought by "intelligent" forms of automation.