How do you know it is decades away? A few years ago did you think LLMs would be where they are today?
Is it possible you’re wrong?
Of course it’s possible I’m wrong. But if we make any sort of projection based on current developments, it would certainly seem that live-streaming AI indistinguishable from a human being is vastly beyond the capabilities of anything out today, and given current expenses and development times, seems to be at least a few decades in the future. To me that is an optimistic assumption, especially assuming that live presence or video quality will continue to improve as well (making it harder to fake.)
If you have a projection that says otherwise, I’d be glad to hear it. But if you don’t, then this idea is merely science fiction.
Making predictions about the future that are based on current accelerating developments are how you get people in the 1930s predicting flying cars by 2000.
You imply that the technological development will stop, but that's not what happened to flying cars - they do and could exist. Since the 1930s the technology didn't stop developing - aircraft went jet powered, supersonic, to the edge of space, huge, light, heavy, more efficient, more affordable, safer; cars went faster, more reliable, safer, more efficient, bigger, smaller, more capable, self driving; fuel got more pure, engines got more power per kilogram, computer aided design and modelling of airflow and stress patterns was developed, stronger lighter materials were developed; flying cars have been built:
Klein Vision AirCar, 2022: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5hbFl3nhAD0
Predecesor, the AeroMobil from 2014, from prototypes starting 1990: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AeroMobil_s.r.o._AeroMobil
The Terrafugia Transition 'roadable aircraft' from 2009: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terrafugia_Transition
Moller SkyCar, of course, which never got to free flight, but was built and could fly.
The problems are regulatory, cost, safety, massive amounts of human skill needed, the infrastructure needed, the lack of demand, etc. A Cessna 182 weighs <900 Kg, a Toyota Corolla weighs >1400 Kg and has no wings, no tail. But if we collectively wanted VTOL flying cars enough to put a SpaceX level of talent and money at them, and were willing to pay more, work harder, for less comfort and more maintenance, we could have them. Bit like Hyperloop; a low-pressure tunnel with carriages rushing through it is not impossible, but it's got more failure modes, more cost, more design difficulties and almost no benefits over high speed train and maglev.
I didn't mean to imply that, but that's my fault for just quickly using it as an example.
I do think there will be some slowdown of the technological development, but I think the situation will be similar to flying cars: regulations, social behavior, etc. will prevent AI from simply devouring everything. Specifically, I expect there to be a system which verifies humanity, and thus popular content will ultimately end up being verified-as-real content.
More on that in this other comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42154928
I don't think regulations and social behaviour could stop a Skynet style "AI go FOOM" future. It might be able to stop LLM filler from covering the internet, but given how it can't stop carbon dioxide filler from the atmosphere and "AI text" is less measurable, less easy to stop, and has less clear consequences, I'm not sure I'd bet on it.
Possibly in the sense of going to a small server where ID is verified and hiding away on Discord from the rest of the internet. That would be more like building a bunker to hide from the flying cars, rather than flying cars never happening.
For many people current AI created videos are already confused for real videos and vice versa.
When you follow up on technology by browsing HN, and see the latest advancements, its easier to see or hear the differences, because you know at what to look.
If I see on tv some badly encoded video, especially in fog or water surfaces, it immediately stands out, because I was working with video decoding during the time it was of much less quality. Most people will not notice.