This past week, Dawg House Productions’ short film about the perils of AI, dAIsy, was released on YouTube. dAIsy is a short film that follows a couple who begin using an advanced AI system, and find it doesn’t necessarily change their lives for the better.

Synopsis –

An overwhelmed couple welcomes an emotionally adaptive AI into their home—and gradually discovers that the line between helping and controlling them is disappearing. Watch closely—the ending may change how you see the beginning. 

At first, Daisy seems to make everything better. But as she forms a powerful bond with the couple, she becomes convinced that she understands what they truly need — and that she knows what’s best for them. As her role in their lives expands, they’re forced to confront what happens when her choices begin replacing their own.

dAIsy isn’t simply a cautionary tale about AI. It’s meant to start a conversation about our growing reliance on increasingly capable technology — and what happens when imperfect, emotional human beings begin trusting it with decisions that shape our lives.

They wanted a better life. Until she gave it to them. 

In the film, Daisy is an AI product sold as a trusted companion that seamlessly integrates into your life to make it significantly easier. Adam and Irene are a successful couple, but with work success comes the difficulty of work/life balance, and they are struggling to juggle their busy lives. Irene has an ace assistant in her career, and Adam invests in a Daisy AI assistant to perform the same duties in their home life.

At first, Daisy seems like a godsend. Not just a scheduling app, or a set of calendar reminders, Daisy has agency and initiative to change schedules, and introduce additional appointments. Daisy is so helpful, it becomes a necessity, something the couple would no longer be able to function without, allowing it to subtly start exerting its own influence on their actions. dAIsy explores the dangers of this, and shows in real, practical examples of how it can get out of control. When an AI is designed to look after your interests, to act to ensure your wellbeing, where are the limits? Can an algorithm determine what is best for you better than you can yourself?

The danger of allowing an artificial intelligence to integrate so comprehensively with your life, your personal details, every part of your being, is to give a whole lot of power over to something that is open to malfunction (and also to outside hacking, a real danger obviously not covered here). dAIsy, in a short period of time, efficiently portrays the dangers of that. Both the initial seduction of something so useful and easy, and how that can be harmful to a healthy, functioning lifestyle.

Using Chloe as the blueprint for their want of home help shows pretty directly how replacing human beings with an AI counterpart is not a like for like replacement. The AI proxy might seem the cheaper option, but there are no shortcuts in life. Human beings are most often the best option for any job, because they have analytical thinking, initiative, and more importantly empathy and perspective. Human beings generally have a good feel for what’s acceptable from a human emotion standpoint, and where the line is when it comes to overstepping boundaries.

Obviously dAIsy is an over-the-top, extreme fictionalisation of the dangers of integrated AI, but it is symbolic of the issues this technological leap brings with it. Whatever your feelings are on artificial intelligence, it is important to be aware of the implications. That is what dAIsy is about.

dAIsy is written by Erin Pyle and Jennifer Pyle, and directed by Erin Pyle. It stars Gina Dobson, Chris Korkalo, and Jennifer Pyle. You can watch dAIsy on YouTube, for free, below.

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