Deepfake Nightmares, Synthetic Dreams: A Review of Dystopian and Utopian Discourses Around Deepfakes, and Why the Collapse of Reality May Not Be Imminent-Yet

Since appearing in 2017, deepfakes have inspired a predominantly negative public response. Substantial research has been devoted to the danger that deepfake technology-as a deceptive audiovisual device-poses to democratic and evidentiary systems; and to the development of AI and legislative mechanisms to control it. -However, the diverse and multiplying ways in which deepfake practitioners, researchers, and -consumers are now viewing, framing, and using deepfake technology-and its -positive -applications in commerce, science, education, and the arts-deserve closer attention. This article assesses the plausibility of dystopian and utopian narratives around deepfakes to offer a more nuanced understanding of deepfake technology as a novel -synthetic media tool: one which, like any screen-based illusion, can be harnessed for malign and benign purposes, and whose cultural and political power rests-for now at least-not with the machines that create it, but the human beings who use it.