#ai art controversy

[91vaults]

Hey guys. Usually I wouldn't share my text prompts because I put a lot of effort and hard work into them and they are my IP but I'll make an exception in this case :). I've generated a set of images this time.

I'm new to art generation. I've been making art since five minutes ago and I'm already super excited about what I'll create next! these tools are amazing! thinking of getting a red-bubble going

[tickhectic]

:3👍 This

I think you should legally disclose if something is ai just like how you legally have to disclose if something is an ad

[convergeai]

The Role of AI in Shaping the Future of Voting: A Delicate Balancing Act

Voting is not just a procedure; it’s the bedrock of democracy, enabling citizens to voice their preferences and influence the direction of their governance. However, as we stride into the future, the shadow of Artificial Intelligence (AI) looms large, promising or threatening to reshape even this most fundamental aspect of democratic engagement. The advent of AI in various sectors has been…

[mamamittens]

Concerning the recent Sora Open AI thing...

I wonder how long it took to curate the videos that look pretty damn passable. How massive must their library be to get enough video to make a convincing old man. Who is in that video? Is it actually a real AI video or more akin to a video game cutscene?

There's absolutely a concern that should be more seriously taken into account here about such batshit AI art but I can't help but wonder if it'll end up like ChatGP where the server space required can no longer justify the cost of operating it for free like it needs to get that much source material.

There is a fascinating question about how far AI can go in this endeavor before it looks exactly like real life. But apparently no one running the damn thing is concerned about people with ulterior motives utilizing their programs. The deep fake porn and falsified crimes that will inevitably occur.

I'll be interested in seeing how deep the legal protections go if such things wind up in court. There's already precedence with actor portrayals concerning real life people and events. And with all that invested money I have a hard time imagining it going without some challenge.

Oh wait. It already is with the Taylor Swift porn. Blizzard smacked down on porn artists to protect their IP. I can't imagine how complicated AI law is going to get to at least passably protect people from more harmful content produced with their likeness. I wonder if they'll end up with a sort of digital watermark to protect them from legal action...

I suppose all I can do is wait and see. And perhaps revisit glaze and nightshade (was it?) to protect myself. Should have done it sooner but still.

[goblincrowe]

Okay the more I look into the art world as it is (trying to learn how to make money, let's gooooo) the more I realize that AI art... Really isn't taking anyone out of business anymore than any other form of automation is.

There was one video that described the ai art situation to the automation of lace making. The automation took a lot of people out of work- but later that day I saw a video of someone hand making her own lace that was apparently going on display in a museum. I did more research and handmade lace is still Super Expensive.

It made me realize- artists who are truly passionate are going to exist no matter what. Clothes are another good example! Shops like shien and temu exist but you can still find Tons of handmade clothes online, and people selling them making a comfortable living.

Art for arts sake is far more lucrative- because you keep finding new ways to grow and innovate. I think the main thing that AI art is doing to hurt the art world is making digital artists doubt themselves.

AI art doesn't have a lot of things that handmade art has. The little mistakes and sketchy style, the struggle to grow that you can almost taste. I don't know, maybe it's just blind optimism but I think that it's gonna be okay.

[91vaults]

Ok I'm gonna lead with the sympathy...

Look I totally get feeling lost and a disappointed, feeling like you can't do anything and have nothing to offer. I get it. I've been there myself

and you found a fun hobby. I detest AI art for all the reasons but i get it people get something out of text prompting. If they didn't there wouldn't be such an influx of people getting into it. I've tried it, its a fun novelty (for like an hour or so) and getting what out of the bot gives you that dopamine hit. People think their prompts are a skill...whatever, you do you

BUT what you found was a shortcut. A shortcut to having and honing a skill. A shortcut that gave you a quick rush. You pumped out art and posted it and got the accolades and yeah that feels good.And holy shit you got offered a job and the temptation was too great to pass up. And you fucking lied.

If you were content with creating with AI you would have been upfront about it, but you weren't because it wasn't about making stuff with AI. You lied because you wanted to be a skilled "artist" without the work. Thats the difference between being an AI creator and using it as a shortcut

I can respect people who are open about the fact what they make is done with AI (even if I feel weird about the ethics of using it in the first place) but this is truly pathetic...and again I get it, but taking shortcuts like this or tracing and claiming it as ones own is never the way out of feeling like a failure. It only gives a quick rush and then you're found out...

and you just got found out

and you deserve to lose your job.

My advice in the future (I mean yeah she's not reading this but still) is to pick a goal and try to work towards it, and most importantly identify the issues holding you back and try to tackle those.

Because there is no shortcut to making it out of a rut. All the MLM's scammy "courses" run by grifters and pesudo inspirational "business" instagram accounts are evidence of this.

There's probably stuff they can do to weed this kind of thing out. Really scrutinize someones portfolio for a consistent style and other "tells" of AI art (which is still possible at this stage). Ask about their process and the tools they use, heck even request a live demo..which isn't great for artists and would only be employed by companies willing to go to the effort.

It will be very interesting to see if similar situations arise in the future. Companies will likely be perfectly happy to hire a "prompt engineer" but if they find they can't meet business needs then maybe after some time saying you use AI will be a major turn off

methinks the most realistic situation is companies wanting quality work will look for someone with an artistic background who also has experience with generation (the hot new thing!) the "skills" of a prompt engineer as they are now may not be sufficient

but hey, there's also plenty of places willing to pay extra cheap for "good enough" so we'll see,

this gives me unbridled joy

look at this idiot getting an actual job at a studio because of their AI generated images lmao while actual artists struggle for years to get seen let alone get work

and now they don't know what to do cos they're not an actual artist xD

this moron is getting exactly what they signed up for

edit to say for a moment i thought i should feel sorry for her but you know what? nah. she knew exactly what she was doing. she lied when she uploaded the images, she knew she was getting the job because she lied. and then she continued to lie even further. so no. not feeling sorry for a lazy stupid fraud getting caught in her lies.

i also question the competence of the studio people tbh cos how blind are they to not see her stuff was made by an AI?

[makiruz]

You guys are so stupid

[arandomassortmentofbytes]

"Images generated by Midjourney and other AI text-to-image tools are not protected by US copyright law since they "are not the product of human authorship", according to the nation's Copyright Office.

Last September, the USCO approved an application for Zarya Of The Dawn, a graphic novel created by Kristina Kashtanova, registering the work as intellectual property protected by copyright. The decision reinvigorated the legal debate over whether digital artwork created by the latest AI text-to-image tools could be copyrighted or not.

However, the USCO has reversed its initial decision and scrapped the copyright certificate previously issued for Kashtanova's comic book. After reviewing the case officials ruled that the text, selection, coordination, and arrangement of images used to create the novel are the work of Kashtanova and can be protected by copyright – but the individual software-generated images themselves cannot be."

- The Register, 24 Feb 2023

The full copyright decision is available here: PDF.

[half-asleep-artist]

So I heard a bit about this controversy about someone who was doing Ai art and posted this girl with a cat. So many many artists re-drew this piece in there style or with other characters. And I just thought for fun I’d try it <3

I did this re-draw with teen dazai and sensei the cat :D, hope you all like it.

(If anyone wants to find the original piece try searching “girl with cat in front of face Ai”)

[91vaults]

Because why the hell would someone who is actually trained/can draw spend all that time wrangling something out of the bot instead of just…drawing it themselves?

The prompters are always going on about the amount of time tuning and post adjustments they have to do to get decent final image. That’s a lot of time you could spend just drawing or practicing your skills. We’re all short of time as it is and you have to choose where you put it. (I make the distinction between that and using an AI for a composition/color pallet/ start for your work)

[bean-counter29]

I can't actually reach out to them because they preemptively blocked me (lol), but let me tell you: finding out that my AI art from earlier this year was more or less blatantly plagiarized was the funniest thing I've seen ALL YEAR.

I don't even care about the tracing or lack of credit! It took me all of 5 seconds to generate this lovely Zelda on the left, I can hardly claim to be it's creator! I'm just laughing my ass off at the whole situation!

Alas, the post has since been deleted. But Phayz/Epicsauce, thanks for making me laugh. No hard feelings here.

Receipts below:

Also, the link to my original post: https://www.tumblr.com/bean-counter29/742809128787951616/cyberpunk-loz-never-fails-to-impress?source=share Note that this was done in February, when Epicsauce's was posted in April.

[convergeai]

Inconsistent Selling Practices on Etsy: Navigating a Crafty Conundrum

Introduction Etsy, the beloved global marketplace for handmade, vintage, and unique goods, has long been celebrated for empowering artisans and small business owners. However, beneath its creative facade lies a complex web of inconsistent selling practices that warrant a closer look. This blog post delves into the nuances of these inconsistencies, shedding light on the challenges they pose to…

[91vaults]

OK I don't want to make a habit of this because its bad for my blood pressure but this is basically every awful argument rolled into one

"So let me get this straight: y'all decided to use a free service to host your art on the internet, agreed to their terms (without reading them), and literally handed over your data to them - and now you're all upset that they capitalised on your data?"

Ok correct me If I'm wrong but I don't think the platforms themselves sold the data to those who make the models. That data was SCRAPED from public available sources. Those are different things. Even if they did that's an incredibly fucked up thing to do. Even if they can.

"Where was the massive uprising of software engineers against GitHub, the free code repository hosting service used by most software developers?"

People weren't raging against copilot because copilot isn't at the point of taking away jobs from software developers. And software developers and those in that space are well compensated for the work they do. But it sure as fuck had (and still had) some people a little bit nervous for what it might mean in the future, and they should be if they value their jobs.

Did anybody ever say: "But what about the innately special, irreplaceable quality of hand-written code, written by a human?!"

if you think so little of art and view it only as a commodity to be consumed then I really can't help you. And I actually do care about who writes code because shit code has really bad implications. Both security and otherwise

But I digress

Don't tell me you wouldn't feel some kind of way if software engineering got the automation treatment. You honestly have so little pride in your work you wouldn't give a shit?

I did CS in Uni. Programming is a skill that takes time and dedication to learn.

It's about solving problems. learning the logic of how to write algorithms and finding a solution that is not only logically sound but efficient. Code that isn't a spaghetti mess of bullshit.

Software engineering is about learning design patterns, understanding why they are used and knowing how and when to implement them.

Computer science is the study of data structures and algorithms. Understanding how data structures work in order to use them, understanding computational complexity and how best to write efficient code.

And if none of that then years of experience writing code. Either on personal projects or in work.

Now imagine Copilot becomes pilot. Now you don't have to know shit about any of that. You can get anyone (and pay them a lot less) to type in the prompt and there you go! they can call themselves a programmer

And hey maybe you wouldn't care. Progress right? well except now you're out of a job. But hey you can type prompts for less than half the pay so its all good!

and to top it all off they trained the model on code that was publicly available. They went and replaced programmers using programmers themselves! ain't that something?

I'm not saying copilot will take all the jobs of software but it sure as heck IS in the realm of possibility.

If you're concerned that AI art will destroy an already tenuous labour market for art, you are absolutely right in being concerned. Your job market will be seriously imperil'd by this new development, and that is a very uncomfortable situation to be in.

And this is fine? you are absolutely fine with all the media we consume being AI generated? people are ok with this? why? why was humans making art a problem that needed to be solved? Even commercial media we consume has teams of dedicated and passionate people behind it, that's what make our favorite shows , art games, movies (the really good ones) what they are.

Lives will be financially uprooted. Your anger at this is not unfounded.

Yes and people are well within their right to do what they can to protect their interests now matter how futile other people might think it is. They are well within their right to go out kicking and screaming. They are well within their right to fight for the skill they put so much of themselves into.

I just wish that y'all were mature enough to be honest about that instead of making flimsy, low-quality arguments about "plagiarism" and the "legitimacy" of "real art"…

Ok, Here it is, here is the actual crux of the issue beyond subjective criticisms (most of which I don't agree with)

I am no ML expert but I do know that these models, whatever area they are in cannot produce the results they do without fuckloads of data

ya get that? they need the data. No data no """AI""""

So your image model goes out and scrapes a whole bunch of data from artists. Some of it is public domain but a good deal of it is not. Some of it is work posted by independent or professional artists.

Now artists are suddenly realizing their pictures have been scraped. Watermark artifacts are showing up in image generations peoples styles are part of prompts. Like the prompts contain their handles/names to specifically generate something in their style. Something which would not have been possible had their work not ended up in the dataset.

These artists did not consent to this.

This isn't like some dipshit reposing a tracing of your work. Its not even the same as someone stealing your work and selling it on a Print on Demand Service.

You said it yourself. This is meant to replace artists

Your image spitting toy cannot exist without artists work that already existed.

Again: every image you generate could not exist if it weren't for the the artists work that it ate.

This is different from artists "taking inspiration" If I take inspiration from an artist (lets say Comic Artist Darrick Robertson) which I have done. Short of tracing his work and passing it off as my own I cannot replace him. If I take inspriation while developing my skills I do it in my own style. And again, I am one person I cannot replace him. I cannot replace all comicbook artists. By taking inspiration I am developing my OWN artistic style and abilities I have my own motivation and intent.

I don't want to get into the nitty gritty of what the model does and does not do from a philosophical perspective because that subjective but the model is one great big entity that eats everything. It can and will spit out an image for someone. It has no intention behind what it does. It has no interest in developing itself. It will do one style or it will do another. It will do all of them for whoever types the prompt. You eliminate the artist.

also the fucking thing isn't a person? it's a tool?

Anyway.

Their work has been taken and fed into a model used to replace them. Fed in without their consent, without compensation.

Isn't it curious that OpenAi and the people behind Lensa App are large companies that stand to gain so much out of this? they will make millions. Yet the artist's work, that they could not have done anything without. Those artists are not only uncompensated but royally fucked.

If in some alternate reality you took every artist: sat them down and gave them a quick overview of what the training meant I guarantee a good portion of them would opt the fuck out.

But no one asked the artists did they? OpenAI talk a big game of ethics but they knew exactly what they are doing. The commercial benefits are just too great.

Imagine you work for a company writing code and without you're knowledge they've actually been training a model not only on your code for work but on your personal projects. Then one day they fire you because they don't need you anymore. And then mock you for getting mad.

The people on Artstation do not want AI images on there because it is a professionally geared platform to showcase their skills. And rightfully so

And before you start blaming capitalism for "ruining art" please understand that it's deeper than that… It's not capitalism.

Mate, it's all about the fuckin capitalism. Capitalism is what makes art into a commodity. This is the natural end point of that. Remove the human element so that companies don't have to pay people to do the work. Art can be pumped out for consumption. You said it yourself, that's what art is right? a thing to be consumed regardless of who did it or the process. Does this result in better art? does this benefit the consumer? fuck no. Look at what happened to translation. Machine translations are kinda worse but are are "good enough" and good enough for cheap is what companies like to hear.

Like what I said about these companies. The benefits of this do not trickle down to the common people except for nerds who are amused by a pretty picture program.

And it could not be done without the artist.

There is a whole legion of nerds out there for whom these machine learning models are an art-form

There are lot of artists for whom making art is an art form

Those nerds could have picked up a pencil at any ti- ok ok no I'll stop. We aren't going to go into my personal opinion on image gernation.

I mean if image generation turns your crank then sure, go nuts. I think its very creatively limiting and robs you of engaging with the process but hey I don't know anything.

For many engineers, the pursuit of AI technology is our life's ambition

For many artists the pursuit of art is their life's ambition????

Something we've dreamed about since we were children.

Ask any artist working or otherwise what they dreamed about as children?? go on I dare you

I exist in both worlds and I cannot fucking belive you would ridicule and dismiss artists in one breath and then "our dreams UwU" in another. The cognitive dissonance is astounding. STEM people are not special and they sure as heck are not immune to the technology fucking them over.

but they don't realise that it's just STEM following the same course it always follows. Technology is just gonna advance because that's just what technology does

Technology does not exist independent of capitalism

TECHNOLOGY DOES NOT EXIST INDEPENDENT OF CAPITALISM

TECHNOLOGY IS CAPITALISM ON STEROIDS

Seriously So many people aren't against technology. Even artists are cool with AI on its own but because of the way its been used is the issue. We live in a capitalist world and tech reflects that. Peoples facial data gets scraped to train Facial recognition models. Those models can be used for serious harm. Behavior analysis models based on faulty science now screen job applications in video interviews. Automation will absolutely replace your job (if it can) and has no interest in weather or not the job you get after is meaningful or fulfilling. Facebook sells people's data, social media shoves algorithms in our faces to increasing engagement because M O N EY.

Oh and I haven't even gotten to NFT's. The most pointless grift that (ironically) pretended to be about artists making money and devolved into gifts, useless art, and just outright stealing artists work and minting them and then going hyper grift and using generated images. They were such a coked up version of capitalism but kind of fizzeled out because even the common folk couldn't figure out the actual utility. Same goes for blockchain/crypto. It used to be good for buying drugs but now its just a pointless solution to a problem it hasn't found.

Yes there are projects that exist outside that realm in the open source or self funded space (like AO3 or to some extent tumlbr) but to pretend tech is some natural force outside the structures it lives in is 10x level of naive or willfully ignorant.

Engineers will always create new technology for the same reason artists create new art; it's what we have in our hearts.

You can do a million things OTHER than automating art.

Also find it wild that you can draw a connection between peoples hard work and passion and yet just say that you want to automate that away for some people without blinking. Like that's fuckin wild.

Despite this whole screed I am not in fact some doom Sayer saying that automation is going to come for all our jobs in the next 5 years (I am HIGHLY skeptical of most of the positive spin on automation though) but this is one of those clear cut cases where the tool is out and it has its commercial application. I think this is the worst application of automation and I absolutely support artists who are doing their best to rally against it. They might get mocked but its better than rolling over. I do believe frameworks need to be introduced.

Anyway I think you have little understanding or appreciation of art, of the process or the work it takes. Nor do you have any respect for artists and I think this reflects the attitude of the most vocal AI art enthusiasts (I will not use the term artists, if I'm being elitist bite me)

The "Anti-AI Art" crowd is cringe af

So let me get this straight: y'all decided to use a free service to host your art on the internet, agreed to their terms (without reading them), and literally handed over your data to them - and now you're all upset that they capitalised on your data? Like, really? Did you think that Artstation was paying for the free hosting and storage that they provide so as to like, do a service to humanity? Are you naïve? The outrage is hilariously misguided given the reality of the situation.

Just to give a (perfect) counter-example - months before AI art really started blowing up GitHub announced CoPilot: an AI tool that just flat-out writes code. Where was the outrage from the tech community?

Where was the massive uprising of software engineers against GitHub, the free code repository hosting service used by most software developers?

Did anybody ever say: "But what about the innately special, irreplaceable quality of hand-written code, written by a human?!"

Even to me, as a software engineer, this seems like a preposterous notion. After all: why would you - the user - give a shit about who wrote the code that powers your devices and applications? Frankly: you don't. You shouldn't! You just want your things to work the way they are supposed to work. I don't blame you.

Most of of the "Anti AI Art" posts I've seen are people floundering through badly-formed arguments about the artistic legitimacy of AI art and whether or not it somehow indirectly counts as 'plagiarism'.

If you're concerned that AI art will destroy an already tenuous labour market for art, you are absolutely right in being concerned. Your job market will be seriously imperil'd by this new development, and that is a very uncomfortable situation to be in. Lives will be financially uprooted. Your anger at this is not unfounded. I just wish that y'all were mature enough to be honest about that instead of making flimsy, low-quality arguments about "plagiarism" and the "legitimacy" of "real art"...

And before you start blaming capitalism for "ruining art" please understand that it's deeper than that… It's not capitalism.

There is a whole legion of nerds out there for whom these machine learning models are an art-form. For many engineers, the pursuit of AI technology is our life's ambition; Something we've dreamed about since we were children. I think some people desperately want to frame this entire situation as "late-stage capitalism" but they don't realise that it's just STEM following the same course it always follows. Technology is just gonna advance because that's just what technology does. Engineers will always create new technology for the same reason artists create new art; it's what we have in our hearts.

[weaselishmcdiesel]

theres a youtube channel profiting off and lying about ai art and it's pissing me off

@/tendofarms on youtube uses ai art in the thumbnails and videos of their animal crossing compilation videos, claims it to be made by them despite also giving credit to a @/lumasi.png on instagram, who claims it's "a comission." this art is also being sold on merch on the channel's etsy account.

They haven't posted a video in 2 months but to see that they've made money through this scheme really pisses me off. Also the fact that they're attempting to decieve people by creating a fake artist on instagram who posts the ai art. They've attempted to say the art is a blend of original art made in photoshop/illustrator as well as the help of ai art. I dont believe this is true and im going to show your asses why

On their first video, they say

"my normal workflow so far has been to paint backgrounds, then get Ai to help with character design, i bring to photoshop to select my favorites, and put together something from my personal painting combined with my favorite Ai characters. Hope this clears things up :D"

The art in question:

and if you have no issues with it, here are MY issues with it

i'll pretend for a second that this person did make the backgroundand ignore the fucking surreal characters. sure. ok so what the fuck are these details. and also how did the ai manage to match your style so well? it doesnt have a backglog of years of YOUR work, does it?

On another video, they say

"a lot of illustrator/photoshop work went into this art. I used Ai to get ideas for composition and generate some character ideas, still some stuff i wish i improved but i think i got it to a decent final stage. Hope you guys enjoy the art and the mix <3333 love!!!"

the art in question with my notes.

The reason this particular post stands out to me is because in the DESCRIPTION of this video, they say the art was made by @lumasi.png on instagram. So when i go to their account and find this art, i see this

so, ok. was it a commission or did tendyfarms make it using a lot of illustrator/photoshop work. and if they ARE two different people.. wow their styles are so similar thats crazy /sarcastic as fuck

I would also like to point out that @/lumasi.png's first post, one that isnt featured in a tendyfarms video, also reeks of ai.

But maybe this isnt a big issue. Their etsy after all only shows that theyve made 16 sales, and their most popular views sit around 100k views, which probably isnt enough to even earn a stable living from, so who cares.

Just. as someone who listens to a lot of music from youtube mixes/compilations, who also makes art, i feel it's really fucking disrespectful to try and claim art as your own in a space where i go to try and relax or find new musical artists. and it's fucking rampant! i have to check each mix to see if using ai for the art, which i can only really see if i click on the video, giving them a small boost in stats. And if they arent using ai art? theyre probably stealing the art directly from an artist and not giving proper credit. Forget about asking the artist for permission, it's not like countless youtubers have explained how thumbnails are The Most important element of a video. Just go ahead and take someone else's work to give yourself some cash.

I know tumblr users hate generative ai already, but i'd just like to give a little attention to what youtube looks like, and to try and ask for more vigilance, more comments calling out the bullshit. I dont see a lot of comments at all on tendofarm's posts! or any mention of ai can be brushed away with "oh i used ai as well as drawing it myself" :/ you didnt buddy. you just didnt do that.

Idk what the right thing to do is, report their etsy? report their youtube? does either company care? maybe you can tell me

but i should probably say dont harass them. as much as i would like to. just try your best not to give retention to videos that shamelessly and ile about ai. Really look at the videos, really scrutinize if you can spare the time to. thanks

also. is it just me or do the cats in lumasi's pfp and this etsy reviewer's photo look the same. not sure what this could mean. up to you

[bythehearts]

not to bring tiktok drama on tumblr but like every time a ‘scandal’ comes out with one of these ‘production companies’ that make fan films i always hope we’re finally gonna discuss how they professionalize something that should be an hobbyist endeavor… and yet every single time i’m disappointed.