Eghhh. I don’t know whats been up lately. I’ve been on an insanely short fuse and as such - Cass & I have gotten into a few arguments and such over the past week.

The fights were mostly stupid but drawn out, consisting of both people believing the other is wrong about something. With my personality, it leads to me going nonverbal and internalizing a lot of shit. Cass on the other hand will get frustrated that I’m not responsive, gets depressed & on edge, then usually removes herself from the situation.

The latest one revolved around the ethics of AI, my position being that generative AI is always unethical- no exceptions. While I know her to have used tools such as midjourney in the past and her position being that all tools available should be used at the user’s discretion - ChatGPT and generative imaging included.

My problem with that stemmed from the outright plagiarism that AI, not to mention the lack of artist/writer’s consent. AI images are, at it’s very core, stolen. These services attempt to mimic artist while meshing and forcing images together in unethical ways. I don’t have an issue with artificial intelligence itself - it’s the human factor that is unethical. Users of these services seem to find joy in the financial struggles of others, artists and writers who depend on commissions for financial reasons. Ultimately it’s a grim manifestation of the worst aspects of capitalism; Lack of empathy, stealing from another to bolster one’s own position. Artist Kelly McKernan whom specializes in fantasy art is one such victim, one whom has a fair bit to say regarding the issue:

This issue, McKernan [emphasizes], stems from the fact that the data set was created for nonprofit use, yet various companies have exploited it for profit. The artists, whose works have been incorporated into these AI programs, often go unpaid and uncredited. Companies like Midjourney, against which McKernan is currently involved in a lawsuit, recommended using artists’ names as file names, both living and deceased, when their beta program was launched in July 2022.

McKernan further elaborates “Many artists aren’t even aware that their work is in a data set. How can they opt out when they don’t even know they’re in?”.

Ultimately AI isn’t creativity, it doesn’t enhance the user’s skills to any degree - it’s simply plagiarism that is as easy as a few keywords.

One of my personal favorite artists, Alex Sears (Death & Milk) has also been impacted by usage of such tools,

Also resharing posts such as,

My conclusions

While I have no issue with the usage of AI in certain contexts - it can be quite useful for certain aspects of life, something I’ve been intimately familiar following an extensive Machine Learning & AI class I’ve taken via Harvard (online).

While it has the capacity to be helpful, I firmly believe that in it’s current usage, generative AI causes more harm than good. It is ultimately a form of thievery and laziness while being a profitable tool for capitalists. To no degree can AI be used ethically (With certain exceptions), as it consists entirely of the work of another - often without that person’s knowledge or consent. It represents the continual moral degradation of society, and I hope more than anything that these projects become legally limited in scope and usage. There is far too little oversight with AI - which is a terrifying thing.

Links to artist tipping & support:

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