Kickstarter bans AI-generated art enthusiast group "Unstable Diffusion" and refuses to deliver their successfully raised $56k funds

[NumLock21]

1 hour ago, Avocado Diaboli said:

But why is one creative action more valuable than another one? The spark of creativity of writing a prompt for an AI is still an impetus that drove the generation of the work. Me telling ChatGPT to write me a text adventure made that text adventure a reality. The AI didn't do anything it wasn't told to do. I was the person with the idea behind making it a reality. Me telling Stable Diffusion to create an image of Sonic in the style of Beksinksi was just as much of a creative decision as painting it myself. You seem to value skill more than creativity. That's all well and good, but then you need to admit that writing a prompt for an AI that returns a pleasing result is also a skill in and of itself.

If you want to Sonic in Beksinksi style then draw it with your own hands instead of telling AI to do it for you. Can't go out and say I drew this, when you actually didn't.

[NumLock21]

15 minutes ago, LAwLz said:

I am just trying to see if I understand your stance correctly. So what matters to you is that someone studied the field, not how long they studied it. Correct? It doesn't matter how much time they put in, just the fact that they put some time into it.

 

How would you value a really good photography if it was taken by a child who had never touched a camera before? Let's also say it was done on a smartphone with everything set to auto (including the AI pre- and post-processing). They might never have studied the field, but because of the processing happening on the phone and the guidelines presented (for example some smartphones gives indications of how you should hold it, and how to frame things) they still manages to produce really good pictures.

Do you not value their pictures because you don't think they studied the field enough?

 

What if you saw a fantastic picture but didn't know how it was made? Would you think less of it if you later discovered that it was made by an person who never studied the field? 

 

 

To me, it sounds like you value the process more than the end result. I think that's fine if that's how you feel, but I don't like the tone you seem to have that your interpretation of artist is the only true one, when you draw seemingly arbitrary and curvy lines to include everything you like but exclusive everything you don't like.

 

 

I as a (hobby) photographer would be handicapped if I didn't have the modern tools available to me. I would be very confused and lost if someone handed me a Daguerreotype camera. Not only would I not understand how to operate the camera, even if I managed to somehow take a picture I wouldn't have any clue on how to develop the plate afterwards. I 100% depend on a computer such as the DSP interacting with the CMOS for me, interpreting the values it spits out, running the debayering algorithm, maybe running some anisotropic diffusion function on it, and so on. I could probably set some values manually such as white balance, but even then I would have to rely on software to actually control it for me. I can give simple instructions to the camera what I want but actually carrying those instructions out would be completely out of my control.

Without tens of computers involved in the image processing chain of a modern day camera, I would be completely lost, and so would 99,9% of photographers. Are those photographers not artists because they rely on computers, algorithms and other software to carry out the tasks the photographer asks the computer to carry out for them? It is theoretically possible to do the math required to do all those tasks using pen and paper, but I don't think anyone actually knows how to do it.

Sorry, but man you're dissecting this beyond the cellular level. If you took a camera and take pictures, then you are a photographer, it's okay for you to use tools to help with your work.

[LAwLz]

22 minutes ago, NumLock21 said:

I draw the line between an artist and non-artist is by the amount of time they put into the work manually

But where is the line?

Is someone with Synesthesia not an artist because they can effortlessly play a song on for example a piano? No time or effort required. Is someone very gifted and has perfect pitch not an artist because they might effortlessly find the right note and sing well? No voice coaching or practice required.

 

Is someone who takes a really good picture, maybe even on accident, not an artist?

 

 

22 minutes ago, NumLock21 said:

If you drew in Photoshop and used filters like motion blur, emboss, brighten up your image, etc, then you are still an artist because you actually took your time, skills, and creative mind to draw that picture, it's okay to use tools to aid in your artwork

How is that different from making an image in a program like Stable Diffusion? Both are using preprogrammed functions. They give input to the program which then translates those inputs to what the program believes to be the result the user wanted. Same with a camera.

The difference is that the input in the case of Photoshop are mouse movements and settings, and in the case of an AI program its text and settings.

 

 

22 minutes ago, NumLock21 said:

An non artist is a person who doesn't even try and just uses some tool to do everything automatically for them.

But AI programs doesn't do things automatically... They still requires input. The functions they use are automatic, but the input is still controlled by the human. It's the same with Photoshop. Human gives input to the program, the functions translates those inputs automatically to an output.

 

 

22 minutes ago, NumLock21 said:

If you use AI to do the things you want and not bother learning it yourself, then you're not a professional in that specific field, you just took the lazy way out.

What about people who doesn't bother learning how a CMOS sensor reads the data and instead rely on a computer to do it for them? Are those also lazy?

I see that you keep adding the word "AI" to certain sentences when you try and narrow the definition down to just be about AI programs. My question is why does it matter so much how a function works (through a neural network or through more traditional algorithms)? Why is it seemingly okay to create something using a function in Photoshop, but not okay if that function works by using a neutral network? Hell, many functions in Photoshop do use neural networks. Are those also "lazy" to use?

 

 

22 minutes ago, NumLock21 said:

This doesn't mean AI is bad, it has its place. Let's say a person wants to decorate their room with some cool art work, they have an idea in their mind, but they're not artistic enough to bring their thoughts out into the real world, then it's fine for them to use AI to help them with that.

I agree with that. I also think it's okay to use an AI in far more situations than that though. I think it is fine to use whenever someone has an idea in their mind and want a way to express that to someone else.

Is it just that they are calling themselves "artists" that bothers you? Because I think they are artists, but only because artist is a very vague and hard to define word. Like I (think) I said earlier, I define artist as anyone who creates art. I define art as the expression of an idea through a medium. That medium can be photography, paintings, music, movement, or basically anything else. I wouldn't say a painter and a photographer are the same category of artists though. Likewise, I wouldn't say someone using an AI program to create an image is in the same category as a photographer or painter. In my opinion, they are still artists though because they express their ideas through a medium such as images.

 

 

  

20 minutes ago, NumLock21 said:

If you want to Sonic in Beksinksi style then draw it with your own hands not telling AI to do it for you. Can't go out and say I drew this, when you actually didn't.

I don't think you should say you "drew" something if you made it using AI. Drawing is defined as making a picture with a pencil (or similar thing). I do however think it's perfectly fine to say "I made this".

Likewise, I don't think someone creating an image in Photoshop without using the "drawing" tool can say they "drew" something. They "made" a picture in Photoshop, but they didn't "draw" it.

 

 

10 minutes ago, NumLock21 said:

Sorry, but man you're dissecting this beyond the cellular level. If you took a camera and take pictures, then you are a photographer, it's okay for you to use tools to help with your work.

I don't think I am. I am just taking the words you say and applying them to situations other than specifically AI programs.

Again, I feel like you have drawn a very specific line that is intended to only exclude AI art from your definition of "art" or "artist", and all I am doing is pointing out that by drawing these lines you are also excluding other things that I do think you would classify as art.

 

Is it not art because an AI is involved? Then photography should be disqualified because that heavily depends on AI functions these days.

Is it not art because it is easy to pick up and use? Then people gifted with things like perfect pitch or synesthesia aren't artists because they need little or no practice to create what I would consider art.

Is it not art because it is so quick to make? Then taking a picture, which requires just a few seconds, is not art.

 

 

Can you explain to me why a person who uses an AI to create an image is not an artist, without referencing AI itself (no circular definitions allowed) and that doesn't describe other types of artists (such as photographers) when scrutinized? 

I don't think you can do it, because these terms are fairly subjective and relies heavily on tradition. But because they are so subjective I think it's important to not get caught up and confuse an opinion for a fact.

[NumLock21]

3 minutes ago, LAwLz said:

But where is the line?

Take the effort to actually try and learn

 

3 minutes ago, LAwLz said:

How is that different from making an image in a program like Stable Diffusion? Both are using preprogrammed functions. They give input to the program which then translates those inputs to what the program believes to be the result the user wanted. Same with a camera.

The difference is that the input in the case of Photoshop are mouse movements and settings, and in the case of an AI program its text and settings.

You're still using your hands to move the mouse to draw or create the work you want to do. Me typing on a keyboard even thought I'm physically using my hands isn't called using effort in my work. I'm just taking the lazy way out.

 

5 minutes ago, LAwLz said:

But AI programs doesn't do things automatically... They still requires input. The functions they use are automatic, but the input is still controlled by the human. It's the same with Photoshop. Human gives input to the program, the functions translates those inputs automatically to an output.

Entering input isn't called effort, you're just thinking of word to put in so AI spits out what you want. Would you called a person a PC builder if they have never done it themselves before, and tells a robot to do it for them?

 

7 minutes ago, LAwLz said:

What about people who doesn't bother learning how a CMOS sensor reads the data and instead rely on a computer to do it for them? Are those also lazy?

I see that you keep adding the word "AI" to certain sentences when you try and narrow the definition down to just be about AI programs. My question is why does it matter so much how a function works (through a neural network or through more traditional algorithms)? Why is it seemingly okay to create something using a function in Photoshop, but not okay if that function works by using a neutral network? Hell, many functions in Photoshop do use neural networks. Are those also "lazy" to use?

 I used AI is because that's where this problem all started, If AI never existed, this topic won't even be here up for debate.

 

15 minutes ago, LAwLz said:

I agree with that. I also think it's okay to use an AI in far more situations than that though. I think it is fine to use whenever someone has an idea in their mind and want a way to express that to someone else.

Is it just that they are calling themselves "artists" that bothers you? Because I think they are artists, but only because artist is a very vague and hard to define word. Like I (think) I said earlier, I define artist as anyone who creates art. I define art as the expression of an idea through a medium. That medium can be photography, paintings, music, movement, or basically anything else. I wouldn't say a painter and a photographer are the same category of artists though. Likewise, I wouldn't say someone using an AI program to create an image is in the same category as a photographer or painter. In my opinion, they are still artists though because they express their ideas through a medium such as images.

Perhaps different people have different interpretation of what's being an artist, for me is to actually put in the effort and try, while yous is about using what's already available, let it spit out what you want.

[Avocado Diaboli]

2 hours ago, Kinda Bottlenecked said:

You should not attempt to misrepresent my arguments by changing what I'm standing for. Yes tools will make learning things easier. However I am not arguing that we have to gatekeep and protect traditional dogma. What I am saying is that we should define clearly what is and is not. 

You're trying to create a distinction where there is none. Your argument boils down to gatekeeping and protecting traditional dogma. You try to define art on your terms that conveniently aligns with your preconceived notions and not think things through to their logical end point. Case in point:

 

2 hours ago, Kinda Bottlenecked said:

If we were to follow your logic, I too am a music producer because AI can write scores for me. 

Yes, you would be. Let me let you into a little secret about the creative process. Wanna know what creativity is? Making choices. The creative process is always highly iterative, it's literally trial-and-error. You can get better at that by practicing or studying something and getting to know the "language" of the medium you're working in, reduce the amount of errors through experience and get a result faster, but the end result is always bound by the choices you made along the way. Ask any musician and they'll tell you the final composition or recording has parts that have been written and omitted. Ask any painter and they'll tell you they painted over some "mistake" they made. Ask anyone who draws in pencil and they'll tell you they used an eraser. Ask any photographer and they'll admit they took multiple pictures of the same scene to get everything perfect the way they intended. Those are the choices they made along the way to get to the result they wanted.

 

Now try doing it with AI tools. It's a highly iterative process where you as the user have to make the choice which end product you're pleased with, fiddle with the parameters, etc. It's literally the same creative process.

 

2 hours ago, Kinda Bottlenecked said:

Although this is meant to be condescending and an attempt to rouse an argument. You'll see that we are in agreement here since you do not consider me a programmer if I can't write in binary. Which is where I'm coming form. The same way I do not count ai users as artists or producers or programmers is the same way it is in reality.

That comment about you not being able to code in binary was meant to point out the inherent silliness of your argument. We are nowhere near in agreement, my sarcasm evidently flew over your head.

 

2 hours ago, Kinda Bottlenecked said:

If I were to commission you produce a track for me because I do not possess the knowledge to do so. Does suddenly make me a music producer too? Of course not. In this exchange I am the commissioner or the one who asks. You are the producer not purely because you can carve a primitive instrument from stone or play analogue instruments. It is because you have the knowledge to produce music. 

 

Replace you with the AI and you have the same situation.

Actually, yes. If you give enough input to a composer with your prompts, give detailed criticism what to change and have an active input in the final composition through your feedback, you are a producer. That's literally what producers in the studio do, they're not just the guys pushing the record button. A producer for a band in the studio is someone heavily involved in the creative process. And again, you're conflating things. You assume knowledge where there is none required. I can open any DAW, add random VST instruments and throw a bunch of MIDI together without any prior knowledge either about music theory or the software itself. I can do this purely by deciding that I like the outcome without any intent behind it. Is the end result not music?

[Lightwreather]

3 hours ago, Kinda Bottlenecked said:

If we were to follow your logic, I too am a music producer because AI can write scores for me. 

I realise this is incredibly pedantic and not at all relevant but there is a different between a producer and a composer, often they are two different people but in many setting they are can be the same and there is overlap between their roles.

 

A composer is responsible from coming up with the score, whereas a producer is responsible for bringing that to life and making it fit the context

[Kisai]

8 hours ago, mr moose said:

https://allthatsinteresting.com/first-color-photos

 

Yes they did, even patented processes for it.

Kodachrome was the first "color film", what was done before that required more than simply clicking a button, and the result was often difficult to piece together. Just because a wealthy person can afford it, doesn't mean it was actually something people had. Film as we know it, is 1935. There were ways of "colorizing" black and white film before it, but what came before 1935 was a complex process.

 

And to nitpick further, we were still using disposable flashes in the 80's. The ability to take photos, anywhere, anytime, cheaply didn't happen until camera phones, even though digital still and digital SLR's started to be a thing during the 90's, they were not things people generally had until the mid-2000's.

 

Did photographers complain about every innovation in camera photography? Yes. Photographers still exist, and they're the ones that own the $10,000 DSLR's. Your $2000 smartphone takes photos at about the same quality as a disposable $20 1990-era camera in low-light conditions, and the CMOS censor creates warped or blurred photos when you don't put it in a tripod.  These are problems inherent with using a tiny sensor.

 

Now imagine if "AI" was used to "fix" low-light, and generally unusable photos? Perhaps that tech is already being used in smartphones and we don't even know it.

 

[Kisai]

 

9 hours ago, Kinda Bottlenecked said:

 

This would be a false equivalence since the common consensuses is that artists are highly liberal with "permissions" should another artist like themselves wish to reference or study from. Tracing over from one medium to another is usually seen as transformative.  All of what you have listed are how the artist studies. Unlike the AI user, there is no study and no research. There is no understanding of what composes a piece of artwork.  

Like I said, the same people who show no bones about tracing, are the same people who seem to have a problem with an AI doing the exact same thing. 

 

There are not two camps here, there are four.

 

The "AI is always terrible" camp, because it shows them the AI can produce works they can not, or refuse to, so they want nobody to have it. It doesn't matter what merit the AI has, they just see "AI" and want to smash it with a hammer.

 

The "AI is a tool that everyone can use", which is are the people who are developing these tools without a goal of monetizing it, and perhaps without the insight of what people might do with it.

 

The "AI is about replacing the artist", which is the corpo-artist view that they will be immediately replaced, or forced to train their replacement. We all know corporations like to save money, even if it greatly lowers the quality of their products. That will be the result in some cases.

 

The "Nobody is going to use AI for that" view, which is where I believe anyone actually involved in creative works should be. 

 

If you're scared of AI replacing you, then you have no confidence in your skills, or have been faking it the entire time (such as tracing.)

 

9 hours ago, Kinda Bottlenecked said:

The same thing happens when you use code from stack. Will you seek the permission of every single author of the code before using them? Of course not, because we simply don't require that. 

So why should the AI seek permission then either? 

 

You can not make the argument that an AI can not train from the same media that humans do. You're basically making the argument that because the AI is not a human, that it's not permitted in a human space, at all. I'm sure if the animals we all displaced as we built our cities could speak, they would make the same argument that humans have encroached in their space and should not exist there too without permission.

 

 

9 hours ago, Kinda Bottlenecked said:

 

The AI is not permitted to do that because artists are not permitted too. Bad actors are regularly called out for tracing art below acceptable levels and the community has become self regulating in that way. There is a certain level of threshold that you need to cross. 

Again, as I said, artists regularly reference or trace things, and the people who seem the most bothered by AI art generation are those who regularly do that themselves, and it's as though they've been shown a mirror, or worse, that they are putting themselves in the AI's shoes and are being accused themselves.

 

9 hours ago, Kinda Bottlenecked said:

You have to admit that the datasets that are scrapped from the internet are on a scale that is beyond human. And this factor is why AI should be held to higher standards which I am sure most agree with. 

 

Sure, holding the AI to a higher standard than a 13 year old tracing simpsons and pokemon is  reasonable. But where is that line really? There are also 13 year olds who can draw or paint like others have done it for 30 years. Do we yell at the 40 year old artists who only started drawing when they were 30? No. Time is not a factor when it comes to learning how to draw or paint. You can do that at any time. The only factor is how well you pick it up immediately. Some people are really adept can can pick up a new skill in a day, others can't do it in 10 years. The AI here isn't learning how to "draw" or "paint", at least not this generation. 

 

The AI art generation is doing something not much different than that scene in "Detroit: Become Human "

When prompted to "paint", when you're playing that character, you have a choice of several things in the studio, but everything is a "perfect copy", and even the way Markus paints it to the canvas, is like an inkjet printer, there is no intermediate drawing, there is no shading. It's just copy of reality. Carl then chastises the "copy" and tells Markus (the player) that painting is about interpretation, which then leads to "try again", and now this time he actually paints in strokes, which can result in like a dozen different outcomes, but the response to all of them is "oh my god"

 

At any rate, when people are "prompting" an AI, it's still operating on what is essentially "Auto-complete", so it only knows what symbols it's been trained on from CLIP (in the case of Stable diffusion.)

 

Honestly, before anyone else decides to chime in an AI art debate, actually go use DALLE2 and feed it some prompt that would only make sense in late 2022 and see what happens.

https://www.cbc.ca/newsinteractives/features/canada-year-in-pictures-scroller

I picked something off this list.

Hmm, not what I expected, I expected this:

And you know why it can't do that? Because Charles only became King, THIS year. So what dog is that in three of those images?

 

Now imagine if an AI was designed to report on news and try to usurp news pieces directly from newswire services before they were published in newspapers or websites, and every time "King Charles" was mentioned it would turn into a piece about a dog breed.

 

The AI simply does not know what it has not been trained on, and even then, it will never know that "King Charles" is formerly known as "Prince Charles", and various other situations like that, because the keywords are out of date.

 

This is why, the AI models will be quickly out of date, and need to be re-trained every so often (in all likeliness, every year) to be relevant, and in the process, the LAION and CLIP process will have to start over. So it's likely not a particularly sustainable setup if you produce one model based on images gathered in 2020, and then the model can't produce anything that became trendy in 2021 or later. Yes you can warm-start training on updated datasets, but experience has shown that warm-start training doesn't respond well to a change in the dataset, and is pretty much equal to starting over again from step 0, and will lose everything removed from the original dataset in the process. 

 

So, once again, I say the fear about AI art generator models "replacing" jobs is mostly unfounded. It certainly will not be up-to-date without being extortionately expensive in computational power in re-training it daily. Most models will likely be released, and that-is-it. A model designed to produce nothing but anime ships or cosplay, will never know how to produce something from a show or subject that came out after the model. Special-interest (eg porn generators) models will likely not hold peoples interest very long when it can't produce something "new" either.

 

The only place the AI art generators will have any real utility will be in evergreen art generation, essentially generating things that are not topical, but generic. Forests, rivers, lakes, fields, "literal hell", and so forth. Even then, it's most likely going to be scratch data and not something kept in a final image or production, because the value of AI art, at present, is negative.

[LAwLz]

2 hours ago, NumLock21 said:

Take the effort to actually try and learn

So if you are just naturally good at something (like the examples I brought up) and doesn't have to expend effort to learn, you aren't an artist?

And if you take the time to learn about AI art programs, is that suddenly art? Because let me tell you, there is a lot more to these programs that just typing some words in and getting an image out of them.

 

 

2 hours ago, NumLock21 said:

You're still using your hands to move the mouse to draw or create the work you want to do. Me typing on a keyboard even thought I'm physically using my hands isn't called using effort in my work. I'm just taking the lazy way out.

I don't see why you are making the distinction between input using a mouse vs input using a keyboard.

If I work in Photoshop using macros and not a mouse, is that no longer art?

Is it "lazy" to use Photoshop and let a computer do all the hard math that goes into the functions, rather than do the math myself?

Is it lazy to let a camera decide which settings to adjust to get a good exposure?

Is it "lazy" to press a button to signal to the ISP to capture an image using complex neural networks executing in the background in the imaging pipeline?

 

What about "img2img" functions in AI programs? If I draw a basic picture and input that into an AI, along with text prompts as well as several configuration settings and get an image out of it, is that okay in your opinion?

If not, how is it any different than Photoshop?

 

 

 

2 hours ago, NumLock21 said:

Entering input isn't called effort, you're just thinking of word to put in so AI spits out what you want. Would you called a person a PC builder if they have never done it themselves before, and tells a robot to do it for them?

If the person wrote the instructions that makes the robot build the PC then yes I would.

And didn't we establish earlier that the level of effort doesn't matter? I don't exactly expend any effort when I click a button on my smartphone that sets off a chain of hundreds of functions (a lot of which are AI based) which in the end results in a picture being taken. A picture that doesn't even necessarily reflect the real subject I took a picture of. For example Google's camera will analyze the content it captured and then redraw some of it if it feels like it wasn't good enough.

For example if the sensor is unable to capture enough color detail (because of for example low light) then the phone will automatically analyze the content of the picture, try and figure out which color something should be, and then it paints over the picture with the color it thinks should be in the picture. Is that not art anymore because the photographer didn't do all that by themselves?

 

 

2 hours ago, NumLock21 said:

 I used AI is because that's where this problem all started, If AI never existed, this topic won't even be here up for debate.

I am not sure what the "problem" even is.

The way I see it, some artists seem mad that a way of expression might no longer be exclusive to them. That filthy casuals might be able to create art thanks to assistance that previously didn't exist. To me, this is like human translators being mad that software translation is getting better and better, because it means common folks might no longer need to hire a professional translator as often.

 

I completely understand people like some who were mad at ArtStation because the homepage started being full of AI generated art. I totally understand wanting a function to filter that art out, because not everyone is interested in that. It would be a shame if "traditional" artists got buried in a sea of AI generated art. I don't want that to happen.

What I don't get are the people who are still mad even after ArtStation gave them the option to filter that out if they don't want to see it. Those people seem to have the goal to not let other people see art they don't approve of, which just seems like oppression and gatekeeping to me.

Same with these news about kickstarter pulling down this project seemingly for ideological reasons and trying to keep the 99% of people (the ones who can't create images) away from tools that would make them a bit more like the 1% (the ones who can). 

 

What I don't get are the one who try and make extremely specific definitions that fit their subjective opinion about what "art" is, and then come up with excuses for why some stuff is "art" and while other things aren't, and then can't be consistent about their own definitions. 

 

Is art based on how much effort you put into it? Then what about people who are extremely gifted and don't have to put in that much work?

 

Is art based on how much or how little of the final work is done automatically? Then what about cameras, which are like 99% automatic these days since we no longer have to change any settings at all, they make heavy use of pre- and post-processing (even redrawing things in our images), and the imaging pipeline is 100% controlled by the software written by some other person. The only thing us humans do is click a button. Hell, because of things like OIS how we hold the camera doesn't even match what the camera captures anymore. If I move my camera 10mm to the side my camera might think "no, you actually want to move it 9mm to the side, so I'll move the sensor internally 1mm for you". We don't even have full control what our cameras are physically pointed at anymore. 

 

Is it art based on how long you had to study before becoming good at it? Then we once again have the issue with gifted people. Just because I have been struggling to learn the piano for several years does not mean me making a song with it is any more or less "art" than someone who doesn't know how to play the piano, but uses a DAW program to create piano sounds.

 

3 hours ago, NumLock21 said:

Perhaps different people have different interpretation of what's being an artist, for me is to actually put in the effort and try, while yous is about using what's already available, let it spit out what you want.

Yes, and I don't think either definition is more valid than the other. You seem more focused on the process (although only in some situations, not when it comes to for example photographers) and I am more interested in the end result. To me, these programs are just a different tool to achieve the same result, and it's the result that is the piece of art. The Mona Lisa isn't art because someone painted it using oil. It's art because of how the colors are arranged on the wood. At least in my opinion. I think most people would agree though.

[mr moose]

2 hours ago, Kisai said:

Kodachrome was the first "color film", what was done before that required more than simply clicking a button, and the result was often difficult to piece together. Just because a wealthy person can afford it, doesn't mean it was actually something people had. Film as we know it, is 1935. There were ways of "colorizing" black and white film before it, but what came before 1935 was a complex process.

 

And to nitpick further, we were still using disposable flashes in the 80's. The ability to take photos, anywhere, anytime, cheaply didn't happen until camera phones, even though digital still and digital SLR's started to be a thing during the 90's, they were not things people generally had until the mid-2000's.

 

Did photographers complain about every innovation in camera photography? Yes. Photographers still exist, and they're the ones that own the $10,000 DSLR's. Your $2000 smartphone takes photos at about the same quality as a disposable $20 1990-era camera in low-light conditions, and the CMOS censor creates warped or blurred photos when you don't put it in a tripod.  These are problems inherent with using a tiny sensor.

 

Now imagine if "AI" was used to "fix" low-light, and generally unusable photos? Perhaps that tech is already being used in smartphones and we don't even know it.

 

My point is that all technology evolves at an exponential rate not linear.  You can't just pick one thing in the history of any technological evolution and extract it to make a point.  The whole evolution form start to finish including nuances of scientific understanding and social barriers need to also be accounted for.

[Avocado Diaboli]

25 minutes ago, mr moose said:

You can't just pick one thing in the history of any technological evolution and extract it to make a point.

I think you can. Take the printing press and the reaction by monks, who, up to that point, often had the job of scribes. Which meant they were the ones writing each copy of the bible by hand. Some were extremely critical of it and tried to denounce the printing press and any copy of the bible made by it as inferior to a hand-written one. Some even argued that the act of writing the bible by hand imbued it with divinity that a mere printed copy lacked. And of course, the printing press allowed many more people access to just publish anything, even things critical of the church, where before, scribes were also the gatekeepers of what got published and spread. This issue is literally centuries old, it has been on repeat in some form or another for so long now that every time it crops up, I'm amazed people still fall into the same pattern.

 

And I get it, if you're in a position where AI will be a threat to your livelihood, I sympathize with you. Welcome to the communist party, so to speak. Because most of this fear isn't borne out of some general antipathy of the technological evolution. It's just that in the reality of living in a capitalist dystopia, losing your justification for a paycheck is a very real threat that isn't to be taken lightly, so I understand the pushback on that level. The same way how I sympathize with the monks in the 15th century. But the solution isn't artificial suppression of technology or excessive legal regulations surrounding them to make sure people still have a job (though there should be plenty of regulation regarding the distribution of fake news through such tools, for reasons that I think should be obvious). That's just treating symptoms. The disease is capitalism, as always.

[mr moose]

12 hours ago, Avocado Diaboli said:

I think you can. Take the printing press and the reaction by monks, who, up to that point, often had the job of scribes. Which meant they were the ones writing each copy of the bible by hand. Some were extremely critical of it and tried to denounce the printing press and any copy of the bible made by it as inferior to a hand-written one. Some even argued that the act of writing the bible by hand imbued it with divinity that a mere printed copy lacked. And of course, the printing press allowed many more people access to just publish anything, even things critical of the church, where before, scribes were also the gatekeepers of what got published and spread. This issue is literally centuries old, it has been on repeat in some form or another for so long now that every time it crops up, I'm amazed people still fall into the same pattern.

 

And I get it, if you're in a position where AI will be a threat to your livelihood, I sympathize with you. Welcome to the communist party, so to speak. Because most of this fear isn't borne out of some general antipathy of the technological evolution. It's just that in the reality of living in a capitalist dystopia, losing your justification for a paycheck is a very real threat that isn't to be taken lightly, so I understand the pushback on that level. The same way how I sympathize with the monks in the 15th century. But the solution isn't artificial suppression of technology or excessive legal regulations surrounding them to make sure people still have a job (though there should be plenty of regulation regarding the distribution of fake news through such tools, for reasons that I think should be obvious). That's just treating symptoms. The disease is capitalism, as always.

You've just done what I said, you've taken a single point in the evolution of the written word and physical information and made a point that actually only pertains to that one point in time.  But your second paragraph sums up my point regarding why we can't do that to justify preventing the evolution of technology as a whole.   Although I disagree about the disease being capitalism, because if that was the case you can throw out all evolution of technology.   Capitalism needs to be kept in check absolutely (no system is perfect when humans are involved), but it has only improved living standards for everyone over time.   

 

[Avocado Diaboli]

9 minutes ago, mr moose said:

You've just done what I said, you've taken a single point in the evolution of the written word and physical information and made a point that actually only pertains to that one point in time.

No, I literally drew a parallel to multiple times across history where the same story has played out for the same reason, including this instance. To pretend like there's no equivalence there is highly intellectually dishonest and a feeble attempt to create distinctions where none exist. If you want me to take your statement "You can't just pick one thing in the history of any technological evolution and extract it to make a point." seriously, you need to qualify that with some actual reasoning, not present it as a finished statement. Nuance is important. But you can't then ignore the nuance I brought up and say that I can't compare the printing press to AI art because my example only pertains to the printing press. You've ignored the nuance and effectively used your stance as a silencer to not allow people to make comparative observations.

[mr moose]

Just now, Avocado Diaboli said:

No, I literally drew a parallel to multipel times across history where the same story has played out for the same reason, including this instance. To pretend like there's no equivalence there is highly intellectually dishonest and a feeble attempt to create distinctions where none exist.

But that is exactly why you can't do it, especially as an argument against improvements in technology.  There are no distinctions that make the development of the printing press or the inception of the color photograph a valid argument against AI generated art, those happened over many decades, not like AI which has almost sprung from the R+D labs into everyone's homes inside of 1 decade).  It's straight up tech evolution and the condition of how it displaces income generation doesn't really make it a valid argument.  Computers have displaced a lot of workers over the last 3 decades, I don't see anyone here arguing we shouldn't be supporting AMD and Intel when they develop new faster CPU's.

[Avocado Diaboli]

1 minute ago, mr moose said:

But that is exactly why you can't do it, especially as an argument against improvements in technology. 

I made the point in favor of technological development though.

[mr moose]

Just now, Avocado Diaboli said:

I made the point in favor of technological development though.

I know, that's why I specifically addressed the two paragraphs as one supporting my supposition while the other seemed to refute it. 

 

 

[jagdtigger]

20 hours ago, Avocado Diaboli said:

But why is one creative action more valuable than another one?

Seems like you dont get the point, a computer program has exactly 0 creativity, its just grabbing stuff from its data-set as is and stitching it together to match its instructions....

[Avocado Diaboli]

4 hours ago, mr moose said:

I know, that's why I specifically addressed the two paragraphs as one supporting my supposition while the other seemed to refute it. 

 

But it doesn't support your position at all. Your claim was that comparisons are moot because technology evolves too fast for the comparisons to stick. I gave you an example where the parameters are comparable, a disruptive technology that had severe economic implications for those it made redundant and their reactions to that. They are identical, regardless of how fast the development was. If you really want to make a point here, you need to be a bit more verbose why exactly my specific example of the printing press is ill-suited as an illustrative point for the current conundrum.

 

Heck, I could even give you another example. Wanna know why the term "luddite" came into being? https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Luddite

 

3 hours ago, jagdtigger said:

Seems like you dont get the point, a computer program has exactly 0 creativity, its just grabbing stuff from its data-set as is and stitching it together to match its instructions....

Seems like you don't get the point. For one, I already outlined the creative process is iterative in nature by definition and the AI brute-force method is just a hypercharged version of that. But more importantly, I never made any of my comments under the assumption of attributing creativity to the AI itself and I don't think anybody else has either.

 

Proponents of this development don't see AI as sentient beings, and yet the opposition already assumes that scenario, which is why the conversation is steered into this direction where they claim that creativity or an AI model's lack thereof is relevant. Because there is still creativity involved in AI art. Wanna know who's? It's the user's coming up with the prompt and selecting the valid output. AI output doesn't happen out of nowhere, there's always a human mind in the driver's seat. So again, why is a creative action sans AI more valuable than one involving AI?

[jagdtigger]

11 minutes ago, Avocado Diaboli said:

I never made any of my comments under the assumption of attributing creativity to the AI itself and I don't think anybody else has either.

On 12/26/2022 at 4:24 PM, Avocado Diaboli said:

But why is one creative action more valuable than another one?

Yeah you pretty much did.

 

 

11 minutes ago, Avocado Diaboli said:

I already outlined the creative process is iterative in nature by definition and the AI brute-force method is just a hypercharged version of that.

Human creativity is so much more than simple iteration, representing it as such is disingenuous to put it mildly....

[Avocado Diaboli]

4 minutes ago, jagdtigger said:

Yeah you pretty much did.

No, and you just claiming without any substantiation I did doesn't change that fact. 

 

4 minutes ago, jagdtigger said:

Human creativity is so much more than simple iteration, representing it as such is disingenuous to put it mildly....

I know, if you go back and read my entire statement about human creativity, you'll notice that.

 

Seriously, if you don't want to engage in a conversation, why even respond at all? You're not giving me anything to work with and just throwing in snide comments from the sidelines doesn't advance the conversation.

[jagdtigger]

20 minutes ago, Avocado Diaboli said:

No, and you just claiming without any substantiation I did doesn't change that fact. 

So calling the AI's "work" creative action doesnt count as "attributing creativity to the AI itself", yeah right..... /s

 

20 minutes ago, Avocado Diaboli said:

I know, if you go back and read my entire statement about human creativity, you'll notice that.

Then why bring it up?

 

20 minutes ago, Avocado Diaboli said:

Seriously, if you don't want to engage in a conversation, why even respond at all?

This isnt an issue me not wanting to engage in a conversation, the issue is on your side. You keep trying to push the idea that AI generated images are art when it was pretty clear that those are as far from being art as far as Makó from Jerusalem....

[Avocado Diaboli]

1 minute ago, jagdtigger said:

So calling the AI's "work" creative action doesnt count as "attributing creativity to the AI itself", yeah right..... /s

I literally explained in the very next sentence of that quote that the creativity comes from the human using the AI. Did you only read my first sentence and think of a response without reading the rest? 

 

2 minutes ago, jagdtigger said:

Then why bring it up?

To draw the connection that making art of any kind is iterative and that the iterative nature of AI art and text generation are reflective of that and that any end product produced by an AI based on a human prompt is being created using the same process and that the creativity in the process is reflected in the choices made along the way. Seriously, again, I already stated this above. You really need to read my entire posts, not the first few sentences you think you have a "gotcha" against.

 

4 minutes ago, jagdtigger said:

This isnt an issue me not wanting to engage in a conversation, the issue is on your side. You keep trying to push the idea that AI generated images are art when it was pretty clear that those are as far from being art as far as Makó from Jerusalem....

Ah yes, complete dismissal, now it makes sense why you wouldn't want to read my entire posts, you'd run the risk of being convinced and abandon your preconceived notions. Please, just stop responding if you have nothing to add besides "no". It's insulting. 

[NumLock21]

20 hours ago, LAwLz said:

So if you are just naturally good at something (like the examples I brought up) and doesn't have to expend effort to learn, you aren't an artist?

If you drew a stick figure, then you're consider an artist. With time and practice, you'll get better and better at it. All artist has to start somewhere.

 

20 hours ago, LAwLz said:

I don't see why you are making the distinction between input using a mouse vs input using a keyboard.

Using a mouse still requires hand movement. Take drawing a landscape as a example, with a mouse your hands have to actually draw the land, trees, sky, etc. With the keyboard you're just typing the word landscape and the program does it for you.

20 hours ago, LAwLz said:

What about "img2img" functions in AI programs? If I draw a basic picture and input that into an AI, along with text prompts as well as several configuration settings and get an image out of it, is that okay in your opinion?

If you drew a image and feed into AI, then it's okay to ask AI to help enhance the image to the way you like.

20 hours ago, LAwLz said:

If I work in Photoshop using macros and not a mouse, is that no longer art?

Is it "lazy" to use Photoshop and let a computer do all the hard math that goes into the functions, rather than do the math myself?

Is it lazy to let a camera decide which settings to adjust to get a good exposure?

Is it "lazy" to press a button to signal to the ISP to capture an image using complex neural networks executing in the background in the imaging pipeline?

 

As long as you're doing most of the work manually, it's okay to use some help with the tools the program provides.

 

20 hours ago, LAwLz said:

I am not sure what the "problem" even is.

The way I see it, some artists seem mad that a way of expression might no longer be exclusive to them. That filthy casuals might be able to create art thanks to assistance that previously didn't exist. To me, this is like human translators being mad that software translation is getting better and better, because it means common folks might no longer need to hire a professional translator as often.

 

I completely understand people like some who were mad at ArtStation because the homepage started being full of AI generated art. I totally understand wanting a function to filter that art out, because not everyone is interested in that. It would be a shame if "traditional" artists got buried in a sea of AI generated art. I don't want that to happen.

What I don't get are the people who are still mad even after ArtStation gave them the option to filter that out if they don't want to see it. Those people seem to have the goal to not let other people see art they don't approve of, which just seems like oppression and gatekeeping to me.

The problem isn't artist not liking AI generated art. The problem is art-styles done by actual artist that gets stolen, where it's feed into AI, and random people can just generate that style of art, and then go and sell it for profit. The other problem is people using AI to generate an image from a specific style of art, and then paying the creator of the AI program, while the actual artist gets nothing.

 

[Avocado Diaboli]

43 minutes ago, NumLock21 said:

Using a mouse still requires hand movement. Take drawing a landscape as a example, with a mouse your hands have to actually draw the land, trees, sky, etc. With the keyboard you're just typing the word landscape and the program does it for you.

I can also describe a landscape through programming myself, I don't even need an AI for that. If I know how I want the image to look, I can write a program that outputs as its result an image I describe through code. I can tell it to go through a billion pixels and color them individually to exactly the shade I intend and never move a finger to draw something myself.

 

43 minutes ago, NumLock21 said:

The problem isn't artist not liking AI generated art. The problem is art-styles done by actual artist that gets stolen, where it's feed into AI, and random people can just generate that style of art, and then go and sell it for profit.

I can also copy an art style manually and sell it for money. Am I stealing that art style? Do I need to post this video again?

 

 

43 minutes ago, NumLock21 said:

The other problem is people using AI to generate an image from a specific style of art, and then paying the creator of the AI program, while the actual artist gets nothing.

You're usually not paying the creator of the AI program for the creation. You're paying for the computing effort. Never mind that I'm also paying Adobe to use Photoshop to copy someone's style. Is Adobe profiteering from me "stealing" someone's style? 

[NumLock21]

4 minutes ago, Avocado Diaboli said:

I can also copy an art style manually and sell it for money. Am I stealing that art style? Do I need to post this video again?

 

You can't really copyright shapes and such, that looks more like inspiration, rather than stealing like a direct 1:1 copy of that art style.

 

5 minutes ago, Avocado Diaboli said:

You're usually not paying the creator of the AI program for the creation. You're paying for the computing effort. Never mind that I'm also paying Adobe to use Photoshop to copy someone's style. Is Adobe profiteering from me "stealing" someone's style? 

So the payment is given to the AI, does the AI have a bank account, Paypal, Venmo, etc where the payment goes directly to it, instead of the human?