Next Level Seinfeld
Thanks to Jordan Schneider gifting a last minute ticket for an amazing seat, serendipity led me to go to Friday night’s performance by Jerry Seinfeld at the Beacon Theater.
If I had to describe the show in one word, I’d say it was unsurprising. Jerry was Jerry. He had thoughts. Mostly he had complaints. They were all Very Seinfeld.
If I had two words I might say mildly amusing. Which was good enough for a worthwhile evening. Live performances are something special. Every time I’ve gone out to a comedy show, even if a bunch of it was kind of lame, I have been happy I came. The correct bar for worth watching is actually lower in person than at home.
The thought I couldn’t shake as I went home was, what GPT level was that on?
This first came to me during the opening act. His opening act was if anything too on the nose. Very Jerry. Much Seinfeld.
It felt very much like he had GPT-X put together a package of Standard Mildly Amusing Jokes and Perspectives, with the prompt that the performer was black, old, male, never married and the opening act for Jerry Seinfeld. Given the material, delivery was solid.
The question was, what was the X in GPT-X?
I am confident our current incarnation, which is GPT-3.5 or so, can’t do it.
What about GPT-4? Could go either way, if you could try out bits and select winners.
What about GPT-5? Yes, absolutely, if it is what I’d expect, that should work.
So I’d give that act a GPT-level rating of 4.25.
Jerry himself was on a higher level. Not as high as his peak. I’d give him a 5.
What about the best stand-up shows and specials?
I’ve seen 6s. I worry I may have never seen a 7.
To put in context, there's probably not enough media in existence to train a GPT 6. There may not even be enough for GPT 5. At some point, GPT-x tech will turn from an exponential to a logistics curve, just like everything else, and will have to fall back to something more... inductive.
This post has a vivid, specific conceit (or a couple of them—the one I am primarily thinking of is the question "what GPT-n could do this?") combined with vivid, specific opinions that combine to make it punchy and memorable. Which is not so different from comedy itself.
And I don't see ANY pathway from the GPT outputs I am currently seeing or generating to something that could write this post.
I guess I have no doubt that some future GPT-n will be a good cover band, and thus perhaps it could be a good 68-year-old Jerry Seinfeld. I don't see the evidence that it is in any way progressing toward becoming a 30-year-old Jerry Seinfeld — which I guess is your "6"-level standup comedy. What are your reasons for thinking it will go in that direction rather than become an ever more high-fidelity echo of what has already been done and said?