The first rule of AI unemployment is don’t talk about AI unemployment if you’re the company that caused it. Higgsfield.ai, a startup that offers AI video creation tools, recently sparked outrage after claiming it was causing artists to reach the unemployment line.
Earlier this week, the company boasted on X that its AI motion design tool has brought closure to more than 20 creative jobs.
Artists using the service, well aware of the impact AI has on the creative market and perhaps uncomfortable with being complicit in the use of these tools, were not amused, and the post was deleted following a backlash on social media.
“Mr. Higgsfield seems to have realized today that there are red lines in his company’s marketing that should not be crossed,” Motion Management CEO Aharon Rabinowitz wrote in a social media post. “Celebrating the end of an artist’s career (even if their motion design tools aren’t good enough to actually put anyone out of a job) is extremely stupid and short-sighted.”
The company’s marketing claims and actual services have been disputed for months. Online critics have accused the company of:
- The account was later banned for a bait-and-switch that promised unlimited access to services like Google’s Nano Banana Pro.
- Private review astroturfing to counter negative posts on various online platforms.
- Predatory charges.
- Deceptive and blatant marketing.
One online critic described it as “Higgsfield AI: A company built on anger-baiting content, stolen likeness, and sexual exploitation.” Another accused Higgsfield of asking clients to create marketing materials using unlicensed intellectual property in order to shift liability for potential infringement claims.
Higgsfield did not respond to requests for comment. A message sent to the company’s press email address cited in previous funding news was bounced. A message sent to the company’s support email address stated that our inquiry had been forwarded to a human agent, but no one had followed up.
register Menlo Ventures, one of the companies funding Higgsfield, was also contacted for comment. A spokesperson for the VC firm did not comment as requested, but provided information to media outlets, but has not yet received a response.
Ian Hudson, a UK-based software tester and video producer, said: register He spoke about the backlash against Higgsfield in a phone interview.
“The problem seems to be that they don’t really offer much of a service, and many of the websites are really just wrappers for other services,” Hudson explained. “So we make API calls to Google for Nano Banana, and we use a service called Kling for video.”
Hudson said he learned of the service in January thanks to the company’s intensive marketing efforts. He said Higgsfield promised unlimited use of services such as Google Nano Banana and Kling.
“But we don’t really know what’s going on because there’s no explanation,” he said. “Something is either unlimited or it’s not, but it turns out that it’s not really unlimited. You can’t really get something unlimited, you can just try it out easily. And it turns out that it has terms and conditions.” [that say] If you use it too much, you will be prohibited from entering or exiting. ”
Hudson said Higgsfield queues user prompts and delays them for an arbitrary amount of time before being routed to the underlying third-party AI service.
“So while it appears to be unlimited, it’s not because you’re throttling for a long time to get results, you’re only getting a fraction of what you would get if you went directly to Google Gemini, for example,” he explained. “So it’s not a fit for purpose service.”
Hudson also criticized the company’s marketing practices, which include making controversial posts to generate attention and drama, then deleting them to hide evidence.
And he challenged the restrictions placed on refunds. He said Higgsfield refuses to refund anyone who has used the service.
“Basically no one can get a refund, because the only way to get a refund is to try it without touching the bleeding thing and see if it actually works,” he said. “As you can see, this is fundamentally unfair. This is where the credit card companies are going down, because they’re saying, ‘Well, we’ve looked at the terms and conditions, and we’re complying with the terms and conditions.'”
Complaints of this nature are prevalent on social media and the company’s Discord channels. “…it is clear that your marketing is deceptive and your service is not working,” Thursday’s post reads.
The posts complain about unavailability of service, unacceptable wait times (4-10 hours for a 5-minute video), censorship errors, and false marketing.
Hudson took issue with the company’s engagement bait marketing strategy.
“A lot of people say, ‘Isn’t it amazing that you’re doing that?'” he says. “No, that’s not true. That’s childish and unprofessional. But what they’ve done in the last few days has been something like, ‘Our product is so good that we could fire 20 creators.’ Something along those lines. And their entire community is creators, so a lot of people were upset. ”
Robert Scoble, who has been an internet influencer since before the term actually existed, claimed in a social media post last week that he spoke with the people behind the Higgsfield Influencer Network.
“This guy is trying to get attention in a world where no one else is getting attention,” he mused.
In the words of Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray, “The only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about.”
Moral or financial bankruptcy is also pretty bad. ®
