But it’s still inherently immoral. Just because I’m never going to buy a car, doesn’t mean it’s alright if I steal one part from a thousand different cars and build my own. That’s a bad metaphor, though, because in this case I wouldn’t be doing the actual building.
Going away from economic or legal issues, AI art is inherently morally wrong. It is taking things from thousands of artist swithout asking for permission or consent. Doesn’t matter how little it’s taking, or how much it’s “remixing” it, it’s still inherently immoral.
Ai can be used as a tool for inspiration, but when it comes to use it for character references I’d rather someone just commission an artist or hell just draw it yourself! You might think it looks terrible but i’d love to see someone’s own personal art of their character over AI any day.
There’s currently a massive class action lawsuit going on in the US suing the major AI “art” generators with some massive names in the industry backing it. One of the court documents got posted online and there’s a direct damning reference in the discovery to it being likened to a copyright infringement laundering service for hire by the creators of the algorithms.
Generative AI art was never invented in good faith. The whole original point was to steal from artists and violate copyright.
AI art is very inspiring, though. Honestly, nothing gets me inspired for practicing drawing more than seeing an AI art picture and thinking “God, if that’s the alternative, I’d rather just do the blood, sweat and tears thingie”.
I’d invite you to read through some of the posts in these threads made by the likes of Acrona, where it’s spelled out pretty clearly that computer generated images absolutely are having a damaging impact on the livelihood of artists. The comparison between that and chefs vs frozen food isn’t nearly the same.
Even aside from the ethics - assuming the inevitability of AI, the way to make sure it develops in a least disruptive and exploitative way includes being ABSOLUTELY ruthless to AI devs, profitmakers and apologists, de-normalizing it, pushing the culture to view generative AI usage as hard cringe.
Even if you’re a techno-optimist, don’t emphatize with the artists much or personally enjoy a milquetoast generated fantasy portrait from time to time, it’s just strategically the right thing to do and I hope I don’t need to explain why.
I think better comparison is furniture. You could get cheap stuff from IKEA, but many people still opt for getting something done by real craftsmen.
Art done by an actual person will also always have perceived value of being a work of a human no matter how good AI becomes.
You can get relatively cheap mass produced furniture from IKEA (or other stores) and yet you can still get expensive, high quality hand crafted furniture from other sources. Hand made and human made goods will never go away. The value and quality of the latter will always be better.
I mean the rich don’t buy expensive designer brands, they get their stuff handmade
and in my profession, there is at least a dozen options that provide options for unskilled labors to do what I can without the years of education and knowledge, yet there is a demand for me still.
The human touch will always be in demand, if not in quantity, then in quality.
Authentic art being restricted to the few who’ll pay for that ‘human touch’ won’t be of much help to the thousands of artists out there trying to make a living. That really will revert things back to when art was the purview of the privileged few.
And that is sad.
but it is also a change many other professions have had to endure.
The way I see it, we either scramble quickly to write up a set of reasonable rules to restrict the usage of AI or the digital artiest market will gradually become smaller, until only the masters of their craft can make a living of it.
But its worth keeping in mind, there are many different forms of art and AI art is not a threat to all of them.
there are plenty of artists who live off their work safe from AI.
some carve stone statues, some mold figures out of clay, a person in my family is kinda famous for his paper cut out art.
Imo, what makes the subject even more sensitive in regards to art & automation is that being an artist is often a big part of a person’s overall identity. Arts are a way to communicate one’s internal visions to the outside, and it generally takes a long time to develop an artistic voice that stands out. Without looking down on any other professions/jobs, an artist’s job is often much closer to their internal world than say, working in vehicle manufacturing or cleaning services. The conversations here have touched on automating jobs that are closely tied to culture and human expression/communication. Aka we’re more interested in learning about the thoughts, feelings and experiences of other human beings than those of a robot, which I guess is exactly why some people who are in favor of AI generated images would still rather play with actual people than with Chat GPT.
It’s very understandable for people to be upset about their artistic voice, a part of themselves, to be used in the way it is by the current image generators.
Art isn’t just pretty to look at. It serves a purpose, just like any other communications work. Like Acrona said, it loses its purpose if it’s replaced with robots.
There’s a reason fine artwork fills up your needs in the Sims. Hehe.
I think as an artist it’s important see generative AI as kind of a mirror held up in front of you - if you get a feeling that a machine - made for regurgitating and replicating a very primitive slice of “median high quality digital art” - is treading on your ground, that’s a point to reflect on - maybe there is some complacency and stagnation in the field (there is - there always is).
Purely pragmatically I would recommend everyone to at least try branching out - narrative, animation, 3d, interactive, recontextualization, weird styles, own universes, etc, not just because it’s less AI-replicable (and generative AI -will- hit a ceiling in how much of an artist’s soul it can steal, thankfully), but also because it’s cool and fruitful and there’s no better time to.
I would say it comes out equally much from a number of other careers- Like people who choose to become fire-and policemen out of the want of wanting to keep everyone safe. Or people who are farmers, people that are trained soldiers and/or mercenaries by choice. I know one person from each of those careers, two of them being very close family members, and I can promise you that their work is/was a huge part of their identity.
I’ve seen that used a few times in defence, but it falls apart as soon as you peek at their TRP image gallery. “Immortalise” as an incredibly generic bland AI creation that looks like every other AI generated elf, orc, human etc. Especially if they churn out 20 renders and dump them all into their TRP gallery and as such completely remove any plausibility that the art is unique or even interesting.
Definitely. Some of the professions you mentioned are also more tied to lifestyle (such as farmer), while the others such as firepeople are much more difficult to automate due to the nature of their job.
My comment was more aimed at the remarks along the lines of ”job X got automatized in the past too, that’s just how it goes” that often don’t take into consideration how different the nature of the professions may be generally speaking.
Another “profession” challenged by technology and a cultural monopoly beginning to unravel. People will do what yields them the most with the least cost. More news at 9.
