NewsNTech
The render economics of AI-generated video made synthetic human likenesses a studio-budget proposition for most of the 2010s.
Victor Riparbelli founded Synthesia in 2017 on the thesis that the compute floor would drop far enough to put that capability inside a laptop workflow. Four years of middling results followed before he changed course.
Where the cost curve meets the founding idea Riparbelli's original ambition was specific. He wanted Synthesia to let any individual produce Hollywood-quality video without a crew or a camera.
The compute existed to do this in 2017, but at a price that served studios, not individuals. That gap between technical feasibility and economic feasibility is where Synthesia spent its first four years.
Keep reading