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

Argent Dawn
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As an aspiring illustrator this is a topic I’m incredibly passionate about, but unfortunately I’m running a bit low on time at the moment. So I’ll simply share this.

Part of the joy in writing, art, and honestly roleplay is the journey and the work it takes to finish something. Do not feel discouraged if your work is not perfect. Let yourself be a little messy. That is the beauty of it, really- the humanity behind it.

Don’t deny yourself the satisfaction of completing a piece, project or concept you crafted with your own hands. Yes, it can be hard at times. I know it is, believe me. It is something I struggle with every day! But by skipping the process to instead churn something out of generative AI, you are essentially taking autonomy and creativity out of your own hands. Is that really worth it on top of the ethical issues and environmental impact?

I’m someone who has only been roleplaying and playing WoW for a little under two years. In that time, I’ve learned how to creatively write, code TRP profiles and my art has vastly improved. I think even my photography composition and photo editing has gotten better. All simply because of this silly little game.

I’m by no means perfect, of course. I still goof up, I make funky anatomy mistakes and I’m still a little shoddy on the lore. But I say this to hopefully reassure someone that it is possible to create something out of nothing, with just a little time and patience.

Please don’t rob yourself of the opportunity to learn something new.

Speaking of TRP coding. If anyone wants to learn, here’s a nice little resource. :heart_hands: https://trpsecrets.carrd.co/

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Not relevant to the topic at hand, but I need to give a huge round of applause to whoever made the ‘Lo-Fi Maldraxxian Beats to Best and Conquer to’ background.

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AI could never

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I am kind of obsessed with the slime cat in there.

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I think the artistic community adds a lot of value to spaces such as Warcraft.

It is something that inspires roleplayers to create more stories, explore certain vibes, and adds a touch of detail to our characters. In other words, it encourages the exploration of World of Warcraft in all its shades and possibilities.

This kind of richness offered by artists can’t be emulated by AI: it is the mark of a community that wishes to genuinely engage and create out of passion. It is something to be treasured and preserved because it is what the hobby of role-playing thrives on. For this reason, I don’t think AI can really take away Argent Dawn’s creative community, and I believe it is a good thing that there is a pushback against it… to an extent. More on this later.

I think it is good that there is a market for fantasy art: the demand and offer determines the prices, so I see nothing unfair in what artists demand, even if I would personally classify good works of art as very expensive even for western standards, let alone other economies!

As for the ethics of AI, I believe they are a very much valid concern as current artificial intelligence involves quintessentially stealing art without the owner’s consent. I also think it does not add that type of value that human-made art does, for the above reasons, and so it’s basically a pointless pursuit.

With that out of the way, I will also add that I see a lot of toxicity in this thread, and personally, I don’t like the tone being used, and this connects to another thing, which is that there is a dark side to WoW’s artistic community. And people should be able to discuss about this.

The players bias. Some people will judge your toon more positively once you have artwork of your character, thus creating an incentive to having art about your character. This is a bias that I don’t think it is necessarily unwelcome (as in a way it shows a player’s dedication to a character, and I believe there are other ways to do the same thing without art) but some people can get carried away, for example by demanding art of your character in order to be taken seriously in a guild, or to avoid trying to kill your character (“because you already invested in it” WTF) and so forth, which can come across as a tad too much.

A second problem, is that when we speak about art, people can have some shades of elitism: there are people incentivizing these practices by turning artistic pursuits into some kind of ubermensch practice as opposed to other jobs.

Art is never “too expensive”? You are either someone who isn’t economically responsible, or someone whose economic status is well-above others (you person who bought all the HOTS skins back then, truly a worthwhile investment, I have been told).

You know what is expensive? Life. Spending money on a portrayal of your fictional character concept is a whimsical desire, mind you, and so it is natural that it is something not everyone may want to enjoy or afford, especially because this is a damn non-profit hobby. Condescendingly talking down about people’s economies, or unwillingness to spend, or inability to, is just rude and in bad taste.

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I don’t think anybody is doing that.

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and as said elsewhere there are artists ridiculously underpricing themselves and offering high quality art for far lower prices than they should be.

and arguably so is calling artists struggling to make a living on their skills in today’s AI heavy climate elitist and condescending for not wanting to be replaced by a soul-less coroporate driven machine.

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Okay I would like to clarify my defense of that statement - art is never too expensive for the artist. If an artist wants to charge £300 for a pencil sketch then that is their decision, because they either know they will get clients (either through pre-existing reputation, or because their work is genuinely that good), then that is their choice.*

*Or conversely the artist might just be kinda delusional but then it’s still your choice as the commisioner to recognise that their work is not worth your money.

What I’m not saying is that everyone should spend that amount - rather I’m saying it’s plausible for most people degree of expendable income to find someone else who will do a pencil sketch for like, £10 or £20. Is that still beyond some people’s means? Absolutely - but I feel like if you’re playing Warcraft on an evening, then that sort of expenditure isn’t likely to be excessive.

Maybe it might be for some people - but the point I’m trying to make is that if an artist charges “too much”, it’s not a difficult task to find someone who’s prices are more reasonable to a commisioner.

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Finally, words to explain what I’m -actually saying-.

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I once saw a Youtube video with the title of “Technology isn’t fun anymore”, or something along the lines. Didn’t watch the video itself, but I can wager a guess it had at least partially something to do with all the “AI craze”. The title, though, stuck with me.

I work in a field in which I have the unwanted honour of following the trend of shoehorning “AI” into services that DO NOT NEED IT AT ALL. I can get that actual AI, or even “AI” can have it uses in certain fields but my lukewarm take is that the likes of chatgpt or midjourney(?) or all the unnecessary “AI” fidgets in social media are hyper-capitalistic solutions to problems that did not exist in the first place.

I’ve tried to find uses to chatgpt. Simple old-fashioned “googling” still beats chatgpt and the likes, most of the time. I’ve tried to use chatgpt to help me in brainstorming ideas for certain situations in TTRPG campaigns, or to come up with interesting new spells for caster characters. In all honesty, sometimes it’s given me some interesting ideas, but it doesn’t beat going over to Reddit and asking the creative hivemind for inspiration and ideas. At the end of the day, one is human interaction, human creativity, and the other is mimicry if even that.

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Every argument about the potential for AI art in roleplay falls flat because art is not at all necessary for roleplay.

If you can’t afford it, that’s fine. This is a text-based hobby, you don’t need it. Art is pretty and I enjoy looking at people’s galleries, but whether someone has art or not has no impact on my decision to RP with them - at least, not entirely; I do swerve people with AI art proudly displayed, I fear they’ve rather missed the point if they consider art so important they’re willing to display something so soulless.

As for those that generate text? You aren’t roleplaying - and yes, we can tell you’re doing it. If you want to see a fantasy story unfold before you and you don’t want to write anything, we call that reading. Buy a Kindle. Stop wasting my time.

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I can get the worry, but the hyperbole is not really needed.

There’s also a major distinction between visual and written mediums, not to mention the applications in both with regards to AI have varying degrees. Machine translation and the like have been using AI for years now. My position on AI has been with any technology, it should exist to enhance and improve an experience.

Helping others express their (own) ideas in a better and more creative way? Or to be better understood by others? Great, bueno. Using it to write badly formulated messes? Less so.

In the visual medium realm there’s even more immediately obvious problems. While both writing and drawing are artforms, the old saying ‘a painting is a thousand words’ is very pertinent. People are going to see the latter more immediately compared to the former. It’s pretty hard to fly under the radar with using AI Artwork, even if the ability for it to replicate increasingly human work increases.

Using AI to effectively steal (as in take to then make profit off) other’s work is abhorrent. This kind of thing definitely needs to be regulated and shunned. Its the same effect as plagiarism in the academic sense.

However, a big however with caveats, we are talking about a hobby when it comes to roleplaying. If I see someone with AI art in their profile. Bothersome, problematic even. Is it directly affecting my experience by their experience being ‘enhanced’ ( as they will most likely see it ) ? No, not in the slightest.

Now, if they start speaking ChatGPT to me? Yes that is directly affecting mine and others too around us, especially if it’s done in public. It’s not even a churlish thing to say, it’s logorrhea in its base definition. You wouldn’t do it offline in the high street.

Now, the caveats. I think an inquisitorial, haughty attitude to these people will not work. In fact there are plenty of insidious people online who will exploit the sense of persecution others feel and you will harden their hearts to change their ways. Attacking someone personally, ascribing labels to them, namecalling, etc, for poor choices almost never makes them rethink their ways.

However I do think we can be the reasonable ones. There are plenty of more valid reasons to limit AI use such as the energy and environmental costs, which I personally consider to be of a greater importance. A more “Hey buddy, that’s quite a bit of art you have going there.” Start is better than going “You have AI art therefore L + Ratio haha, blocked. Also telling my guild/discord group to blacklist you too xxx” Will achieve better results.

Sometimes starting conversations with people can get people to critically think about their choices.

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I don’t meant to be dismissive of it, but how often is this something that does actually occur for people? Because thinking about it properly for myself, I have never experienced someone else showing less interest in me or my characters for not having art.

Any feelings like that has been directly from myself feeling insecure in the past for thinking others had so much cool stuff.

If someone is really got at something that I am not, and I want their services, I don’t think its that terrible that they get lauded and praised for it.

I view artistry like any artisan job, in that people should be able to support and life of it as a career. But many artists struggle alot with surviving just on art alone, and I actually think that is a shame.

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I think for some people the point isn’t to make some folk re-think, but to show that they and such practices just aren’t welcome.

Taking the people who try and make money from AI by selling “services” to others as an example, I have no energy or desire to try and get them to change their mind, but I have no problem in showing and telling that I think they shouldn’t even be here and feel unwelcomed.

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Whenever you announce that art is never too expensive as some kind of principle, you are downplaying the issues of the costs for the customer.

This is a free market, and people should be able to decide what they can or want to afford, just as artists should be able to set the price they want: let then the market decide if they still get a job.

I would agree that it is quite rude and passive-aggressive, sometimes discussions can get into a vicious cycle. I feel like this accusation stems often from people resenting artists for having the courage of pursuing a risky, but individually rewarding job, as opposed to other people pursuing jobs that reward people for less creativity, but grant more stability.

On the other hand, artists invest a lot of time and energy into a creative pursuit, and often feel like their efforts are not recognized as much as they should be, which can grant them no small amount of internalized anger ready to burst against the “common man”.

Overall, it is a delicate issue because from one side, I think this is a call for sympathy, because it’s true, succeeding in the arts is a struggle. On the other side, there may be a call for realism because at the end of the day, the market should decide, not sympathy alone.

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It’s shiney and new.

The electrically heated butterknife of yore, funnily enough, isn’t in every house.

AI definately has its uses. But they’ll bludgeon it into everything for a while.

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To follow on what Acrona said in the previous thread:

I’ve been following one of the cases you linked a while back when you made that big post about it. The case is still underway but a halfway ruling was made last year that now made generative AI companies liable for lawsuits if and when an artist’s work can be identified as having been used as a training model without their permission. The lawsuits are heavily leaning towards generative AI being a malicious breach of copyright.

https://hyperallergic.com/943250/judge-says-artists-can-sue-ai-companies-for-using-their-work/

Prime examples of this are that Studio Ghibli AI tool which is frankly disgusting in of itself.

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I think some people see price tags of 300€+ for artwork and perhaps get the wrong idea about how commissions work.

Artists, ultimately should (and often do) price based on supply and demand. Their creative output, or supply, is ultimately not very flexible (except ofc for rendering, coloring, lining in pricing structure), where demand is very flexible. The more well known an artist is, the more people want to commission their work, and to keep requests in line with supply, the price increases.

A commission happens when an artist’s skills and availability meets your budget.

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Oh, I think this is very rare, and it’s a situation that can be called out and resolved pretty easily by bringing awareness to it. It is a minor issue, but it is a bias that exists.

In many ways, it’s not unlike, for example, PvP titles and people using them, who had (?) a pass on claiming that title IC. As soon as some people started to question the validity of this practice, it fell out of use quickly.

I have mixed feelings on this.

When it comes to a lot of jobs, ultimately, our sympathy and goodwill alone can’t dictate what should and shouldn’t be a good source of income, otherwise we would live in a fantasy land where a lot of useful jobs would not even exist.

In the end, I believe the market should be factor when it comes to people pursuing their dreams, and sometimes that happens at the tragic expense of good-intentioned people.

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Whether or not artists can live on their craft is unfortunately just how a gig and commission economy for luxuries works.

I’d wager that the world has never supported more artists and artistry than it does right now.

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