The Ethics of Machine-Generated Imagery and Text, A Discussion

Argent Dawn
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To prevent the Unpopular Opinion thread from being derailed, I’ve decided to make this one for the discussion of Machine generated imagery, or ‘AI Art’, which many characters on Argent Dawn now utilise as visual aids or description authors.

My personal opinion is largely analogous to this, but I’m going to avoid talking about my -political- objections in this thread:

My Opinion on AI Content
Generally put, I think most AI-Generated visualisations lack the personality, individuality and charm of conventional, traditional or digital artwork. Characters, more often than not, resemble soulless dolls to me, rather than pretend-people.

I personally cannot see the value in AI Imagery, with the possible exception of using it as a research tool in early stages of concept art - for example, ‘how might this unusual mixture of aesthetic elements be blended?’

The Ramifications of LLM
The Data-Aggregation Systems we call ‘AI’ might be here, and here to stay. But that doesn’t make it right.

Besides the enormous environmental cost, I believe it erodes at our abilities to independently think, create flawed things for ourselves, and to learn and independently question.

I believe the long-term costs outweigh the short-term gains, whether money is saved or not.

Cylons: Or When LLM Overtake Creativity

A few months ago, I was roleplaying in a small group of people when one character accidentally copy-pasted ‘ChatGPT Says:’ into their dialogue box. It became clear then that rather than embodying the character they were roleplaying, they were utilising the LLM to generate their dialogue and descriptions.

It was shocking for me at least, as not only was it hard to spot, but in essence, it meant I had not been roleplaying with a real human being, just what the algorithm believed I, and the other player, wished to read.

I couldn’t help but be reminded of the Cylons from the 2005 version of Battlestar Galactica. Synths from Fallout 4, if you’re younger.

While I recognise this instance was rare, I nevertheless found it troubling, especially given the amount of effort and care I personally try to put into writing my characters and then playing as them.

However, I can’t help but wonder if years of entrenched elitism, judging the flaws of other roleplayers, valuing those with art over those without visual representation, is perhaps why there is this drive towards a kind’ve sterile, machine-cut perfectionism. People wouldn’t use LLM or Content Aggregation to create for them unless the conditions were that they felt the need to.

A Hypothesised Solution
If we were a kinder, more sensitive community, more tolerant of others’ flaws and idiosyncrecies, more accepting of chaos and more welcoming of the outcast, I don’t think AI-generated material would have half as much appeal as it does.

I don’t personally believe we should sacrifice our imaginations to eldritch data-churners owned by unaccountable oligarchs. We should create, and we should fail, and make mistakes, in our journeys to do so.

Share your opinions below.

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My opinion: AI art sucks and it’s time people stop devil’s advocating it.

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I don’t really care for it, but if I see a link to arts in your TRP, and it says AI gen. I’m going to be less excited to look at it.

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There was an older thread on this and my opinion hasn’t changed.
https://eu.forums.blizzard.com/en/wow/t/ai-art-as-character-reference-and-now-some-very-unrelated-conversation/480013?page=3

Use of generative ‘AI’ to create images is based upon theft of artist’s work to train their data models, and is inherently immoral, even if not (yet) illegal.

It’s not okay, and I would side-eye anyone doing it.

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I find AI to be a Pandora´s box we´ve opened that might lead to complete destruction of creativity and the example you mentioned with someone using ChatGPT to RP is far, far worse of a problem than people using AI pictures and a symptom of what I´m fearing is going to come.

While I didn´t discover anyone using AI in RP yet, I had quite an unpleasant interaction with a person in one of community Discords. The talk was about possible creation of a public event (a goblin musical about event in Azeroth´s history that would be approached with the level of tact and understanding goblins are famous for…a.k.a. absolutely none). The first reaction I got was “use AI for it”.

It´s scary that there are already people out there who look at a writing hobby that (unlike actually writing a book) provides instant gratification and doesn´t even have to be of high quality or effort, and think: “I should relegate this task to a computer.”
Literally why do you even RP then? If you just want to read a story, get a book, I can guarantee it´s going to have better plot than most of what you´ll see on AD.

I think you´ve hit the nail on its head here. While I think people would use AI nonetheless (it´s just absurdly convenient and humans like convenience), it definitely didn´t help that there were RPers who valued characters with art more than those without. I even recall hearing some horror stories about guilds where people were expected to get art, otherwise they wouldn´t be allowed to stay.

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As it becomes more and more prevelant, I become less and less patient about it. It’s gotten to the point now where if someone openly shows that they’re using AI that I now just distance myself from them entirely. I don’t have to tolerate it, and so I don’t.

I’m tired of being told it’s “the future” and being told to just adapt to the times purely for the benefit of those who do use LLMs. No. I’m not adapting, and I’m not tolerating the unethical for the convenience of people who are bringing something inherently uncreative into a creative medium.

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I detest it. I detest what it represents. I detest that it spits in the face of actual artists who put time and effort, often years of it, into their skills to create something satisfying to them and others. It’s pure robbery having been trained on 90% of work that was not consented to be stolen and fed to this monstrosity. It’s advocates are nearly always obnoxious and abusive when the ethical and environmental costs of it are brought up and having the audacity to say you care about creativity in a hobby like RP while using something so devoid of it just because “oh pretty* picture.” is about as two-faced as it gets.

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AI is becoming worryingly prevalent in all aspects of life, including my work outside of roleplay. Amateur (and professional) theatre groups are becoming increasingly dependent on AI-generated images for their casting calls, posters and advertisements. Directors are using AI to generate “character references” on their casting calls to give auditionees an idea of what sort of look they’re going for.

I had the harrowing experience of another actor in my company showing me an image they’d made of all the cast ran through an AI-generator to “look more like their character”. I’ve never seen anything more uncanny, it was me, but not me, my face digitally twisted by the computer.

In terms of roleplay, we’ve reached a point where AI art is publicly pushed back against enough in most “serious” circles that I rarely encounter it unless I’m in a public hub. Despite that, AI is still incredibly prevalent under the scenes; the amount of TRP profiles written with ChatGPT is staggering.

It makes me question what some people seek to get out of roleplay as a whole. Using ChatGPT for character descriptions and emotes removes the writing exercise component, so what exactly is the endgame? When you have AI art, an AI TRP, and even AI emotes, then what role does that player even play in their character besides computer inputs?

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I largely agree with you’re saying, Xynia. Also apologies for being one of the people getting carried away commenting on the subject in the other thread! I’ve already wrote a lot about the subject in other threads so I’m not going to repeat everything all over again right now, but I’ll share my own thoughts regarding your hypothesis:

While I wish this would be so, I’m afraid it wouldn’t be enough. This because:

a) People simply prefer convenience, we just gravitate to conserving energy and resources if there’s an easier solution available. If there’s a shortcut for the same reward or appreciation (e.g. people thinking your emotes and dialogue are cool, without knowing they were generated with a software), there’ll always be people going for it. I don’t think it’s good for one’s long term fulfillment though.

b) The trend of pursuing instant gratification

c) Which is related to our society encouraging more fast-paced entertainment all around (Tik Tok, social media with limited message space vs the blogs of olden days), and people having shorter attention spans for anything

When it comes to having visual art of one’s character - I honestly think it has become too emphasized in the community over the years. For instance, I see so many players these days having a “New art in About” or similar in their TRP Currently/OOC Info section. You don’t see people doing the same for stories. And I think that’s because people don’t expect anyone to pause what they’re doing for 10 minutes, or bookmark a story to read it later - versus looking at an image for 10 seconds. But still, I wish people didn’t attach so much prestige to having a lot of, or expensive looking art of their characters.

I know this might appear ironic coming from someone with a website full of character art. For me, it’s more about enjoying visual arts as a long-time artist myself, and the joy of using it as a narrative medium for a character I’ve had for a very long time. Some people narrate ideas through words, I narrate ideas through visuals. In both people cultivate their own voice to communicate something. And I feel AI generated content takes away from people developing their own voice.

Many of my favourite roleplay acquaintances are those who don’t have much art of their characters. They tend to be pretty easy-going, content keeping roleplay to the basics of written communication, and not fussed about the sex appeal of their character / prestige / community popularity.

Edit: Adding my comment from the other recent thread below regarding generative AI:

Edit 2:

Shared this already in another thread some time ago, but it’s a good listen. The speaker has worked with several companies deploying generative AI, and is pursuing more ethical ways going forward.

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i saw this exact point used last night in a long-post about the long term effects AI generation is going to have on education. while it’s currently at its worst in the US, other countries are catching up in the prevalence of its usage among students from the lowest to highest echelons of the education system.

self admitted confessions from those who used both image generation and chat-gpt to outright cheat their way into college and to cheat their way through course-work seeing no point to college but, and i quote, “networking for fellow ai-startups.” and its things like this that will trickle down into roleplay along the line. people who want to get into the hobby but who have 0 literary skills due to over-reliance on AI. we’re already seeing it. it’s only going to get worse. and it breaks my heart after RP was the outlet that helped me improve my literary skills enough that it vastly improved my writing and grades in high school and college.

in the pursuit of cheap “art” AI’s advocates have only cheapened the art of creativity as a whole.

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I’ve lost count how many times I’ve heard that.

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That is really a thing. In my choice of people I interact with, I pay little attention of how many art pieces they have or if they have a giant Argent Archive page full of well-written stories or not. I ‘judge’ by the roleplay and interaction that is offered to me at first contact and then at the follow ups. I don’t even mind not-so-perfect grammar etc. It is not that I am not a visual person, opposite, I love to make little drawings of things my chars own, their special items, their pets and all such stuff, yet I’d never expect anything alike from anyone I play with.

Sometimes I have the feeling, that there is a trend towards such (lots of art/visuals, long stories) and that might bring others to the conclusion, it would be a necessity. Or as Acrona said, the wish for fast and instant gratification - something that mirrors as well in people not being able to work towards long term rp relationship building (of all kinds, not talking of romance stuff, even though that is included), long term story telling or even long term character development.

I just got aware lately, that people not only use AI for visual references and for their written stories and guild descriptions, but as well as for roleplay interactions. I may sound naive, but the latter didn’t occur to me as a thing - I guess I was wrong.

My opinion on it? It is sad, that roleplayers seem to get the feeling, that everything has to be perfect and polished to be worth it. I think, rp largely lives from improvising, from reacting ad hoc to a situation, from the little imperfections and mistakes. All the things that make a moment unique and that is not the amount of char portraits.

I wouldn’t allow myself to make a conclusion about someone’s political views by their use or not use or stand towards AI generated things though or make assumptions about their personality.

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‘The Ethics-’
That’s easy. There is none.

There would not be incidents in the ongoing court cases where LLM/image gen CEOs are trying to argue that ‘Well you have to excuse us form usual copyright laws, otherwise our product won’t work and that’s not fair!’ if there was an ounce of ethics.

No, it’s not the same as ‘human observation’, there have been extensive writeups by people (smarter than me) debunking that.

It’s greed and grift. It’s late stage capitalism and rampant consumerism, the ‘Must have must have, want want, now now!’ gone rampant. A
nd people have the gal to tone-police artists who are watching their work environment - and, yes, art can be a job whether it’s freelance or self employed or working for a company, just like any other. Some people need to un-tilt their noises, frankly - being burned down around them by techbros who care only about trying to rob the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. The same attitude that people (rightly) call out big names like EA and AAA publishers for, yet are oddly silent here.

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In short, AI is trash. There is no art about it and I have no respect for people using it.

For a longer point, the moral and ethical side has been brought up already and it is something I heavily agree with. AI thrives and exist of the uncredited work of others and it can’t ever make something truly unique on its own. It is used primarily as a grift and it has absolutely no space in creative expression, roleplay included.

As I said in the other thread too, there seem to be this weird notion from AI supporters that artists are super wealthy and some kind of evil elite. It’s often a very bitter and hateful expression from AI supporters over this.

And look, I get it. Art is really cool, and it can feel intimidating if alot of people have art of their characters, but it is not a requirement or need in order to roleplay. And even if I think artists in general are underpaid, art can be an expensive commodity for people. There is a reason why the few art pieces I have has been gifts from friends.

But if you can’t get art for whatever reason, either because you do not want to, can’t draw yourself or can’t afford it, there are alternatives to AI if you still want to flashen and flair up your TRP. I thought I would showcase this with some examples from my current roleplay character.

Example 1: WoW Screenshot

Easily done with just a fancy in-game screenshot and then some very basic photoshop editing with softening and lights. I think it looks good!

Example 2: Heroforge

Bit of a rushjob, but it demonstrates what you can do! Granted, beastial races have it ALOT tougher, but heroforge is updating constantly and its a nice way to also get a reference.

Example 3: TRP text & layout.

Last example, just write too! Yes, I know there is an art link in there too atm, but the meat of the TRP for this character is her TRP description and layout. It’s fun to write descriptive details too, and its part of roleplay!

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Pretty much this.

Also, there’s still no such thing as overpriced art. People can charge what they want. If you don’t like the price, don’t buy it. It’s not about where you’re from.

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The beauty of artists is that their prices tend to be written in advance, even before contact. So it is not like you will get a price you didn’t agree to.

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If in any other job/skilled work position, some ‘Ideas Guy’ came in and went

“Right! We’ve recorded you all (without your permission) and fed that data into a big churning machine, and now that machine is capable of throwing out a fascimile of the work you do! It’s not accurate - in fact, for any detailed work it’s actually pretty bad, and will require human input to fix the myriad mistakes anyway, and it can’t actually iterate at all because it’s not ACTUALLY learning, it just mulched everything into numbers and throws them back out in the ‘most likely place for this number to go in’. So if you want interation you’ll need a person for that too. And its horribly expensive, and terribly energy ineffecient, and its also feeding into a consumerist loop AND actively, scientifically provably reducing peoples thinking and reasoning capacity - but we’ve told a load of very rich investors that it’s the next surefire thing, so we need to MAKE it the next surefire thing. Let’s make a load of problems up that it can ‘solve’, yeah?”

-if you said that in any other industry, that person would be hoyyed out the door for being a raving lunatic. Because they are.

So why do people not see that with art, writing and music? Are people just not-so-secretly telling that they don’t see those as ‘real jobs’? :thinking:

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ai is antithetical to creative output and this is a creative hobby so yuck

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I do find the pricing argument on art pieces a bit silly. You’re already paying hundreds of euros a year to access the game, so clearly you’re not starving, and art wouldn’t utterly bankrupt you.

Yes, if you want nice art from a talented artist with a following, it’s going to run you a lot of money.
Or you could find a guy in Belarus or South America willing to put out some beautiful stuff for frankly heinously low prices.
It’s a luxury and people treat it like they’re entitled to it and that they’ll be ostracized when they don’t have anything to share when joining a guild or chatting in a campaign Discord. I’d honestly rather look at the prompt to make the “art” than see the finished result.

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I always remember one quote from a tweet a year or so back:

“AI should be used to do our dishes and laundry, and instead it’s making music and creating art for us.”

I hate generative AI. I hate how I scroll through AA and I see profiles with generative AI all over the place. I hate that I can’t google anything now without an AI language model giving me an answer scraped from the corners of the internet. I hate that I have to write -AI at the end of every search for a reference.

I hate it.

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