Generative AI and OA

[Godd Howard]

I feel like in many communities online, generative AI is viciously abhorred, and so hosting these images might cause some controversy in the future.

That's part of what I was thinking. Generative AI is only in it's infancy, however there have already been several lawsuits against several of the major AI companies alleging mass copywright infringement. I imagine we're going to see a lot more of these as the tech progresses, and, even if there is no chance of OA being implicated in these lawsuits I don't know if it would be a great idea for the site to appear as if we support generative AI. I don't think that's nearly as much as an issue with the images that used AI as a tool, but I'm pretty sure I've seen a few totally AI generated images in articles before. It might be a good idea to find alternative images to those articles, although in fairness it's not as if I have any alternative images to the site.

[Drashner1]

I feel like in many communities online, generative AI is viciously abhorred, and so hosting these images might cause some controversy in the future.

That's part of what I was thinking. Generative AI is only in it's infancy, however there have already been several lawsuits against several of the major AI companies alleging mass copywright infringement. I imagine we're going to see a lot more of these as the tech progresses, and, even if there is no chance of OA being implicated in these lawsuits I don't know if it would be a great idea for the site to appear as if we support generative AI. I don't think that's nearly as much as an issue with the images that used AI as a tool, but I'm pretty sure I've seen a few totally AI generated images in articles before. It might be a good idea to find alternative images to those articles, although in fairness it's not as if I have any alternative images to the site.

Hrm. This sounds rather a lot like you want us to drop everything we're doing to address an issue that you find personally important but have no actual ability to contribute anything toward addressing.

I think our current approach to this is fine as is.

What other communities think about anything is of no importance when it comes to how we run our community.

Todd

[ProxCenBound]

If folks want, it could be helpful to create a list of articles containing fully-AI-generated images. I can't make any promises as to if or when those would be replaced, but knowing the current situation should be helpful.

[Godd Howard]

I feel like in many communities online, generative AI is viciously abhorred, and so hosting these images might cause some controversy in the future.

That's part of what I was thinking. Generative AI is only in it's infancy, however there have already been several lawsuits against several of the major AI companies alleging mass copywright infringement. I imagine we're going to see a lot more of these as the tech progresses, and, even if there is no chance of OA being implicated in these lawsuits I don't know if it would be a great idea for the site to appear as if we support generative AI. I don't think that's nearly as much as an issue with the images that used AI as a tool, but I'm pretty sure I've seen a few totally AI generated images in articles before. It might be a good idea to find alternative images to those articles, although in fairness it's not as if I have any alternative images to the site.

Hrm. This sounds rather a lot like you want us to drop everything we're doing to address an issue that you find personally important but have no actual ability to contribute anything toward addressing.

I think our current approach to this is fine as is.

What other communities think about anything is of no importance when it comes to how we run our community.

Todd

I'm ashamed to say that's partially true. I'll admit I'm not the biggest fan of generative AI, and, after reading over this thread again, quite a lot of my posts are simply complaints about relatively trivial issues while offering no solution to them. In all honesty I don't have a problem with AI being used to assist in an otherwise human made piece of art, and faults in the artwork aren't necessarily the fault of the AI, so, considering the fact that seemingly quite a lot of the images I had assumed were completely AI generated were actually made in this way, I have very little to complain about. In fairness, I was genuinely interested in OA's policies on AI, but, after that was cleared up, I didn't really have anything meaningful to say, and complaining about something you know relatively little about while offering absolutely no solutions to your problem isn't constructive. I'm sorry for that.

[Nyeti]

If folks want, it could be helpful to create a list of articles containing fully-AI-generated images. I can't make any promises as to if or when those would be replaced, but knowing the current situation should be helpful.

I think this is a good way to handle it. We can treat them as an EG item to improve - encouraging artists to prioritise making new replacements. I'm certainly up for giving it a go.

[Drashner1]

I'm ashamed to say that's partially true. I'll admit I'm not the biggest fan of generative AI, and, after reading over this thread again, quite a lot of my posts are simply complaints about relatively trivial issues while offering no solution to them. In all honesty I don't have a problem with AI being used to assist in an otherwise human made piece of art, and faults in the artwork aren't necessarily the fault of the AI, so, considering the fact that seemingly quite a lot of the images I had assumed were completely AI generated were actually made in this way, I have very little to complain about. In fairness, I was genuinely interested in OA's policies on AI, but, after that was cleared up, I didn't really have anything meaningful to say, and complaining about something you know relatively little about while offering absolutely no solutions to your problem isn't constructive. I'm sorry for that.

Apology accepted.

As you can see from the rest of the thread we are moving to address this issue within the framework of our current policies and processes. If you'd like to participate in that (creating a list of EG pages with fully AI generated images with the goal of eventually replacing them when possible), that would be a welcome way of being 'part of the solution'.

Thanks!

Todd

[Godd Howard]

I'm ashamed to say that's partially true. I'll admit I'm not the biggest fan of generative AI, and, after reading over this thread again, quite a lot of my posts are simply complaints about relatively trivial issues while offering no solution to them. In all honesty I don't have a problem with AI being used to assist in an otherwise human made piece of art, and faults in the artwork aren't necessarily the fault of the AI, so, considering the fact that seemingly quite a lot of the images I had assumed were completely AI generated were actually made in this way, I have very little to complain about. In fairness, I was genuinely interested in OA's policies on AI, but, after that was cleared up, I didn't really have anything meaningful to say, and complaining about something you know relatively little about while offering absolutely no solutions to your problem isn't constructive. I'm sorry for that.

Apology accepted.

As you can see from the rest of the thread we are moving to address this issue within the framework of our current policies and processes. If you'd like to participate in that (creating a list of EG pages with fully AI generated images with the goal of eventually replacing them when possible), that would be a welcome way of being 'part of the solution'.

Thanks!

Todd

Sure! Due to exams and a few courses I'm doing I probably won't be able to spend a lot of time on OA until early july, but I'll have some free time over the next few days at least, I'll try and find a few articles with fully AI images. Off the top of my head I think either the transcension or ascension article had one? Not sure though. I'll start looking later on.

[Drashner1]

Sure! Due to exams and a few courses I'm doing I probably won't be able to spend a lot of time on OA until early july, but I'll have some free time over the next few days at least, I'll try and find a few articles with fully AI images. Off the top of my head I think either the transcension or ascension article had one? Not sure though. I'll start looking later on.

Cool!

Don't worry about the time really. OA's been around for going on 25 yrs now all on the basis of volunteer labor. We tend to move at a rather deliberate pace most of the time. A few months to get something done doesn't bother us at all.

When posting about particular articles, please be sure to include the page title and a link to the page. That will make it much easier to locate them for possible updates later.

Thanks!

Todd

[inkoalawetrust]

My stance on using AI images in OA is that art generators are just a tool. And like any tool, it's mainly about how you use it. Purely AI generated images just picked from the best results might have issues with their structure (i.e the infamous incorrect number of fingers, especially on hands taking a small number of pixels, and other artifacts), especially from earlier generators. So I do think they are usually not the best idea and should largely be relegated to placeholders, simply because they are not that good. But even then a mostly or even entirely AI generated image can work very well, like the santa one. So I think those should be kept since they are up to snuff.

But when it comes to AI images with more manual effort put into them, such as touched up and fixed AI images, and especially images where an art generator was just one of the tools used, like how Steve generally uses them (And how I've used my local copy of WebUI several times). I don't think they are any more problematic than fully human made images or images made using other non-ML procedural tools, like natural landscapes made from noise.

[Godd Howard]

My stance on using AI images in OA is that art generators are just a tool. And like any tool, it's mainly about how you use it. Purely AI generated images just picked from the best results might have issues with their structure (i.e the infamous incorrect number of fingers, especially on hands taking a small number of pixels, and other artifacts), especially from earlier generators. So I do think they are usually not the best idea and should largely be relegated to placeholders, simply because they are not that good. But even then a mostly or even entirely AI generated image can work very well, like the santa one. So I think those should be kept since they are up to snuff.

But when it comes to AI images with more manual effort put into them, such as touched up and fixed AI images, and especially images where an art generator was just one of the tools used, like how Steve generally uses them (And how I've used my local copy of WebUI several times). I don't think they are any more problematic than fully human made images or images made using other non-ML procedural tools, like natural landscapes made from noise.

I would agree with you mostly there. I don't have the time currently to start work on it but what I plan on doing is creating a list of fully AI generated images that I believe should be replaced, giving both a reason for why I believe they should be replaced and offering a rough draft of an alternative for them. Any image that I will list will have a reason for replacement other than simply their nature as an AI generated image. I should be able to get this list up by mid-july hopefully.