Have you seen the pictures of the late great LeBron James attending the new Barbie movie while wearing a pink outfit? People have been sharing the photos on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, and they have gone viral this week. However, they are wholly unreal.
Frequently accompanied by captions such as “LeBron James on the Barbie movie,” the pictures occasionally feature accessories like a pink pocketbook. James is also seen in one of the pictures sporting a pink skirt, albeit the hue is off enough that it might pass for beige.
Notwithstanding their exquisite coloration, the images are artificial and were produced with the use of DALL-E or MidJourney, two artificial intelligence programs. What AI program was utilized to create the phony James images that are going viral on social media isn’t immediately apparent.
One of the bogus photos has had over 260,000 views on Facebook alone, and the political fact-checking group Politifact was even alerted to it. According to Politifact, some of the phony images of James had fingers that are incredibly disproportionate—even “alien-like.” Artificial intelligence technology is still having trouble producing realistic-looking fingers, as we frequently witness when spoof photos become widely circulated.
The recently released movie, which was directed by Greta Gerwig and stars Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling, is a celebration of the popular toy as well as a critical analysis of Barbie’s past. At the box office, the film has brought in over $200 million for Warner Bros. thus far.