Director Guan Jiayong of "Mother's Multiverse": Stop posting 2016 comparison photos; you're revealing human aging models to AI.

As AI rapidly infiltrates the film and television industry and even rewrites the creative ecosystem, Daniel Kwan, director of “Everything Everywhere All at Once,” begins a conversation with a seemingly joking reminder that exposes many people’s underestimation of AI risks: “Please don’t keep posting photos from ten years ago vs. now. They’re using those photos to train machines, learning how humans age.”

Kwan openly states that recent social media trends of revisiting 2016 have made him constantly think about the dramatic changes over the past decade. But what he cares more about is that people upload private images as nostalgic material, ignoring that these images could become fuel for model training. He warns: “Stop. Really, be careful.”

2016 to 2026: Not just ten years, but the end of a world

Kwan describes “ten years” as madness. Reflecting on his debut at the Sundance Film Festival in 2016 with “Swiss Army Man” and his subsequent Oscar sweep, now returning to Sundance, he feels more nostalgic than celebratory.

One reason is that Sundance is about to bid farewell to its longtime home in Park City; this year is the last time it will be held there. For him, this is not just a move of the festival but a larger sense of ending.

This feeling of closure is compounded by signals from various industries. He mentions that Vimeo, a video creation platform, recently laid off a large number of staff and is preparing to transform into an AI company. He says, “Vimeo used to be our home.” Without Vimeo’s Staff Pick recommendations, many early works might not have been seen, and career paths might not have opened. In his view, these events all point to the same thing: the old systems of creation and distribution are stepping off the stage, while AI is rapidly taking over the new order.

Everything seems to be heading toward an end, but he chooses to interpret AI as a transitional phase

Kwan frankly states that when he looks at the world, besides the upheaval in the film and TV industry, the global order is also shifting; coupled with the accelerated advancement of AI, everything seems to be heading toward an end. But he adds a more crucial judgment: this sense of apocalypticism is actually an entry point for understanding AI.

Kwan says, “The way I currently approach AI, or the way I can avoid being overwhelmed by it, is to understand: we are in a transition period.”

In his framework, “end” is not just about loss but about declaring that certain things must be mourned: old systems, old divisions of labor, old platforms, and old power structures. Only by first acknowledging what is disappearing can we take the next step—protect core values and sow seeds for the next world. He explains, “When we see clearly what is ending, we can safeguard our core values and plant seeds for the next world.”

Creators in the AI era: mourn first, protect second, sow last

This “transition period” narrative has also become the underlying logic of Kwan’s recent creative and public advocacy. He emphasizes that this is not just about whether AI tools will make filmmaking easier, but a more fundamental question:

What should we safeguard when the old world ends?

What are we fighting for?

What should we plant for the next world?

For him, AI is not just a technical issue but a competition for redistributing agency: as creators, platforms, capital, and model companies compete for discourse, without sufficient awareness and collective action, rules will be written by the most resourceful party. The reminder “Stop posting 2016 photos” is a modern allegory he wants to convey: in the AI era, every unconscious upload and habitual sharing could become training data controlled by others in the future.

This article, “Motherf***ing Multiverse” director Kwan: Stop posting 2016 comparison photos, you are revealing human aging models to AI, originally appeared on Lian News ABMedia.