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Why not mention the existence of e6ai as the site to post AI gens in the rules to help prevent AI mis-posting. The fact is that, many don't even know there is a e6ai site for that purpose. Maybe in giving the reason for deletion, at least mention it.
Updated by Versperus
ironhorse said:
The fact is that, many don't even know there is a e6ai site for that purpose.
Good, we don't need to actively advertise that an ai version of the site exists
I already fought enough to get it out of all of the wikipages back when I was staff, and even without currently being staff I will fight to not have it in deletion reasons
donovan_dmc said:
Good, we don't need to actively advertise that an ai version of the site exists
I already fought enough to get it out of all of the wikipages back when I was staff, and even without currently being staff I will fight to not have it in deletion reasons
◠‿◠)~★
ironhorse said:
Why not mention the existence of e6ai as the site to post AI gens in the rules to help prevent AI mis-posting.
I don't think mentioning e6ai will prevent mis-posting.
The uploading guidelines clearly state you're not supposed to post AI here and they still miss it.
ironhorse said:
Maybe in giving the reason for deletion, at least mention it.
If you happen upon the deletion page, you can always leave a comment if the comments section isn't locked. If not that, then I wouldn't hesitate to DM the uploader in question.
donovan_dmc said:
Good, we don't need to actively advertise that an ai version of the site exists
I already fought enough to get it out of all of the wikipages back when I was staff, and even without currently being staff I will fight to not have it in deletion reasons
Good????...I assume you have some reason for keeping e6ai un-mentionable.
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ironhorse said:
Good????...I assume you have some reason for keeping e6ai un-mentionable.
A lot of users on e621 are openly hostile to the idea of AI-generated artwork for obvious reasons.
The creation of e6AI was mostly the site's owners' idea, without any input from the e621 community.
While we consider it as a "sister site" due to it being under the same owner and it sharing the same coding, a lot of us do not like associating with the site.
That does not mean it is "un-mentionable" as some of us would still actively direct users who post such artworks to go over there instead.
ironhorse said:
Good????...I assume you have some reason for keeping e6ai un-mentionable.
Yeah, I refuse to sit down and allow promoting actively stealing from artists, then spitting in their face again by making money off of it
donovan_dmc said:
Yeah, I refuse to sit down and allow promoting actively stealing from artists, then spitting in their face again by making money off of it
OK .. I am starting to understand the behind the curtain politics of it .. a little. I wasn't aware of what went on in the background. I also was not being hostile, just didn't understand the attitude. Thank you all, for the information.
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donovan_dmc said:
Yeah, I refuse to sit down and allow promoting actively stealing from artists, then spitting in their face again by making money off of it
I'm...pretty sure e6AI disallows ANY advertising in the art posted? Probably specifically to prevent people from selling AI art.
And, while I understand the hate for AI art, and I am staunchly pro-real-artists; Some people just don't have the disposable income to pay an artist. So an artist is not losing all that $0 from those people.
And being openly hostile to ALL AI art sends the message 'I will treat you like shit for being poor'.
I am not saying you said that, btw. Just saying it's kind of baked into a blanket statement about anti-AI art and claiming it's all stealing from artists.
And yes, before anyone asks; I have had anti-AI people tell me that, if I'm too poor to afford character pics, then I don't deserve them.
Basically, their stance was 'I hate all AI art, and if you are that poor, then I will treat you like shit due to my standards'.
Sorry, got a little soap-boxy. I have a habit of trying to explain my position on something via how it's affected me personally. c.c
___
Honestly, I do think telling AI artists to post on e6AI would help.
And, as I said at the start, e6AI has a rule against advertising. So any trying to grift off image gens would quickly be booted.
I also don't think anyone should be paid for typing key words into an image gen. Seriously, hypothetical people; Why pay someone to gen you an image when you can pay a person to use their real skill to give you something infinitely better?
Honestly, in a perfect world, artists would be able to opt-in/out of having their art used in training, and get paid for its use. Maybe licensing.
AI use grew way too fast and the creators made some dubious choices about art training. And this is what it got us.
They're saying the site itself is profiting off of hosting AI art, not its users.
fuzzy_kobold said:
I'm...pretty sure e6AI disallows ANY advertising in the art posted? Probably specifically to prevent people from selling AI art.And, while I understand the hate for AI art, and I am staunchly pro-real-artists; Some people just don't have the disposable income to pay an artist. So an artist is not losing all that $0 from those people.
And being openly hostile to ALL AI art sends the message 'I will treat you like shit for being poor'.I am not saying you said that, btw. Just saying it's kind of baked into a blanket statement about anti-AI art and claiming it's all stealing from artists.
And yes, before anyone asks; I have had anti-AI people tell me that, if I'm too poor to afford character pics, then I don't deserve them.
Basically, their stance was 'I hate all AI art, and if you are that poor, then I will treat you like shit due to my standards'.Sorry, got a little soap-boxy. I have a habit of trying to explain my position on something via how it's affected me personally. c.c
___
Honestly, I do think telling AI artists to post on e6AI would help.
And, as I said at the start, e6AI has a rule against advertising. So any trying to grift off image gens would quickly be booted.
I also don't think anyone should be paid for typing key words into an image gen. Seriously, hypothetical people; Why pay someone to gen you an image when you can pay a person to use their real skill to give you something infinitely better?Honestly, in a perfect world, artists would be able to opt-in/out of having their art used in training, and get paid for its use. Maybe licensing.
AI use grew way too fast and the creators made some dubious choices about art training. And this is what it got us.
Thank you .. any explanation helps me form a bigger picture.....
Just so we are clear, Donovan's opinion is his and his alone.
It is not reflective of the staff team's position on the matter.
Donovan is not involved in shaping e621's policy decisions.
While most of us do not like AI generated content, we not share his vitriol towards e6AI and its staff team.
ironhorse said:
Why not mention the existence of e6ai as the site to post AI gens in the rules to help prevent AI mis-posting. The fact is that, many don't even know there is a e6ai site for that purpose. Maybe in giving the reason for deletion, at least mention it.
This won't help largely because the overwhelming majority of the AI deletions are either for users who don't know they're posting AI, or artists that believe they can get away with it and posting to the site will be an admission of guilt (to themselves more than anything).
fuzzy_kobold said:
And being openly hostile to ALL AI art sends the message 'I will treat you like shit for being poor'.
Doesn't image generation require an extremely expensive graphics card?
gattonero2001 said:
Doesn't image generation require an extremely expensive graphics card?
No, you can do it locally with a GPU with 8GB of vram and up. It just takes more time (~5 minutes by gen). Or there's web applications, and web services that allow even mobile users to create gens. For better or for worst, it's way cheaper than paying an artist.
donovan_dmc said:
Good, we don't need to actively advertise that an ai version of the site exists
I already fought enough to get it out of all of the wikipages back when I was staff, and even without currently being staff I will fight to not have it in deletion reasons
Based as fuck. The only good clanker is a dead clanker.
gattonero2001 said:
Doesn't image generation require an extremely expensive graphics card?
I mean, I use a certain online AI when I do it at all. (Unnamed out of respect for the 'No AI' rule here & want wanting to encourage AI use)
I don't do local generation:
1. I would have to train it on art. And I refuse to do that unless I had an artist's permission.
2. I have no idea how. But there's no point in learning because see point 1.
strahaspilot said:
Based as fuck. The only good clanker is a dead clanker.
*Sad Protogen Noises?* :P
fuzzy_kobold said:*Sad Protogen Noises?* :P
The species isn't to my taste but I want to be very clear that that's not what I'm referring to.
strahaspilot said:
Based as fuck. The only good clanker is a dead clanker.
Stop spamming the same phrase if you don't have anything constructive to add.
It's borderline hatred to be using slurs like that, even if it's not directed to humans.
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thegreatwolfgang said:
Stop spamming the same phrase if you don't have anything constructive to add.
It's borderline hatred to be using slurs like that, even if it's not directed to humans.
Oh my God, seriously? It's directed at computer programs with zero sentience and a great deal of harm caused by their existence. I'm not saying anything about any sapient being, and if there's sapient AI out there, I'll gladly re-evaluate!
https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/clanker
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clanker
Pointing out how harmful AI is and how it ruins so much (like using so much power and driving up hardware prices) is definitionally something constructive. I'm not referring to any real world group.
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strahaspilot said:
Oh my God, seriously? It's directed at computer programs with zero sentience and a great deal of harm caused by their existence.
Unecessarily charged language is unnecessarily charged. I dislike the current crop of generative AI systems as much as the next person, they're way too reliant on unethically sourced work (either outright stolen/unauthorized use of others' work without appropriate compensation, or using EULAs in required software to force people to give permission when they don't want to), but you're making it seem far more unreasonable with that kind of language.
strahaspilot said:
Pointing out how harmful AI is and how it ruins so much (like using so much power and driving up hardware prices) is definitionally something constructive.
Saying "The only good clanker is a dead clanker." is not pointing out how harmful AI is, it's just spouting hateful language. Besides, as you say, these things aren't alive, thus they can't die.
watsit said:
Unecessarily charged language is unnecessarily charged. I dislike the current crop of generative AI systems as much as the next person, way too reliant on unethically sourced work (either outright stolen/unauthorized use of others', or using EULAs to force people to give permission when they don't want to), but you're making it seem far more unreasonable with that kind of language.Saying "The only good clanker is a dead clanker." is not pointing out how harmful AI is, it's just spouting hateful language. Besides, as you say, these things aren't alive, thus they can't die.
If I dislike something, and there's a way to negatively describe it which doesn't have any real-world ethical issues, I really don't see anything wrong with using it. I'd prefer not to have to mince words if I don't have to. I've been very careful not to insult any actual people, even those I disagree with, and complemented someone earlier for taking a hardline stance against AI.
I hate AI. I'm saying I hate AI. I'm not referring to any actual persons or groups. It's also worth noting that we describe things as dead which weren't alive, either - for instance, a dead game having no players, or a B1 Battle Droid, after being shot by Clone Troopers, being called a dead droid. If AI is shut down and we dismantle data centers to distribute hardware to gamers in poverty or something, that would be good for society.
strahaspilot said:
If I dislike something, and there's a way to negatively describe it which doesn't have any real-world ethical issues, I really don't see anything wrong with using it.
This thread isn't about if you dislike AI or not, it's about whether we should mention using e6ai on posts that were deleted for being AI. Which you can say something like "No, because we shouldn't be promoting that site or AI generated images, because of <their problems>", as Donovan essentially did. But you coming in to any thread about AI just to say "kill AI!" is not productive and can be taken as spamming or trolling.
strahaspilot said:
Oh my God, seriously? It's directed at computer programs with zero sentience and a great deal of harm caused by their existence. I'm not saying anything about any sapient being, and if there's sapient AI out there, I'll gladly re-evaluate!https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/clanker
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ClankerPointing out how harmful AI is and how it ruins so much (like using so much power and driving up hardware prices) is definitionally something constructive. I'm not referring to any real world group.
The two pages you have linked defines the term as being a derogatory slur towards robots and AI.
Since this is not a Star Wars discussion, the term is primarily used here to "express hatred or distaste" towards AI.
@Cinder, the site developer lead and an admin, is our self-proclaimed "friendly neighborhood AI moderator".
Knowing that, would you continue to recklessly spout out a derogatory slur towards AI?
If you had only used that slur as a joke, you have already made the same unfunny joke multiple times by now.
Not to mention the origin of the phrase "the only good X is a dead X" comes from a racist past, so I suggest you Google that.
I also linked the site rules for you to understand how talking like this is not okay.
strahaspilot said:
Pointing out how harmful AI is and how it ruins so much (like using so much power and driving up hardware prices) is definitionally something constructive. I'm not referring to any real world group.
in my view, people who use "clanker" have always come off as, like, roleplaying racism. like they really just want to call people slurs but don't have the opportunity because it's socially unacceptable.
it also is, paradoxically, humanizing a computer program (which was actually kind of the point of it's original use in Star Wars media). and in doing this, you're also entirely shifting the blame off of the actual parties who are doing the harm: the companies who are building mountains of data centres that drive up the energy cost in communities and RAM prices worldwide while plagiarising every single thing that they can get their hands on including through means of mass piracy, and the users who choose to use these services despite the egregious ethical violations that the companies commit.
fuzzy_kobold said:
And, while I understand the hate for AI art, and I am staunchly pro-real-artists; Some people just don't have the disposable income to pay an artist. So an artist is not losing all that $0 from those people.
And being openly hostile to ALL AI art sends the message 'I will treat you like shit for being poor'.I am not saying you said that, btw. Just saying it's kind of baked into a blanket statement about anti-AI art and claiming it's all stealing from artists.
And yes, before anyone asks; I have had anti-AI people tell me that, if I'm too poor to afford character pics, then I don't deserve them.
Basically, their stance was 'I hate all AI art, and if you are that poor, then I will treat you like shit due to my standards'.Sorry, got a little soap-boxy. I have a habit of trying to explain my position on something via how it's affected me personally. c.c
How about a more specific "if you can't afford that artist you don't need art from them"
There are commissions for as little as $5 or even $1 out there, and I'm sure even less where the buying power of the local currency makes $20 a months pay
Looking at artists charging hundreds of dollars for commissions, then using being unable to afford that as a justification for perpetuating theft doesn't make sense
I've seen talk of piracy and the like mostly being a convenience/cost problem, if something costs an entire week or more of your pay why in the world would you buy that over basic necessities, and I absolutely agree with that - I've been there, I've pirated games because I just could not afford them, though later when I could finally afford them I went back and purchased the game
But there's a fundamental difference here, within piracy you aren't taking parts of multiple games, smashing them together, then claiming it as your own without credit to any of the parts
I also couldn't afford art when I was younger, why would I spend the small allowance I got on some art on a screen? But rather than going to make an amalgamation of other artist's work, I got a free base and bucket filled it, or pulled out a fursona maker and called it good
fuzzy_kobold said:
Honestly, I do think telling AI artists to post on e6AI would help.
I don't think closely associating a site that is supposed to be on the side of real artists with a site that encourages stealing their work is in any way a good idea, we already get enough DNPs from e6ai existing
fuzzy_kobold said:
And, as I said at the start, e6AI has a rule against advertising. So any trying to grift off image gens would quickly be booted.
I also don't think anyone should be paid for typing key words into an image gen. Seriously, hypothetical people; Why pay someone to gen you an image when you can pay a person to use their real skill to give you something infinitely better?
The site makes money through advertising, anyone trying to sell ai generated slop is going to get a real nasty letter from Nintendo, Disney, and all the other huge IPs some day, and realize it's definitely not worth it
fuzzy_kobold said:
Honestly, in a perfect world, artists would be able to opt-in/out of having their art used in training, and get paid for its use. Maybe licensing.
AI use grew way too fast and the creators made some dubious choices about art training. And this is what it got us.
Yeah, but while we aren't in that perfect/ideal world, why are we supporting the mega corps that chose to not care about artists when they wanted to disrupt an industry? There are open source models as well as ethically sourced models out there, which while I still have gripes with those if everyone is consenting to what's happening, that's their deal
watsit said:
This thread isn't about if you dislike AI or not, it's about whether we should mention using e6ai on posts that were deleted for being AI. Which you can say something like "No, because we shouldn't be promoting that site or AI generated images, because of <their problems>", as Donovan essentially did. But you coming in to any thread about AI just to say "kill AI!" is not productive and can be taken as spamming or trolling.
I'm not the one who brought it up. I complemented Donovan for a hardline anti-AI stance and not wanting to promote it in any way.
thegreatwolfgang said:
The two pages you have linked defines the term as being a derogatory slur towards robots and AI.
Since this is not a Star Wars discussion, the term is primarily used here to "express hatred or distaste" towards AI.@Cinder, the site developer lead and an admin, is our self-proclaimed "friendly neighborhood AI moderator".
Knowing that, would you continue to recklessly spout out a derogatory slur towards AI?If you had only used that slur as a joke, you have already made the same unfunny joke multiple times by now.
Not to mention the origin of the phrase "the only good X is a dead X" comes from a racist past, so I suggest you Google that.I also linked the site rules for you to understand how talking like this is not okay.
The context for Cinder is very clearly different from generative AI. That's very clearly not what I'm referring to. If you don't like the term, that's fine, but that's not really my point. There's also an argument for reclaiming phrases rather than just treating them like Kryptonite.
Spamming, maybe. Since people are so upset about it for whatever reason, I'll avoid the term. Didn't think people would get so fixated on something so dumb, but I guess it's not worth the argument. Nor am I promoting national, ethnic or religious hatred - Matrix's Zero One isn't a real nation, AI isn't an ethnicity and, thankfully, it's not a religion either.
dba_afish said:
in my view, people who use "clanker" have always come off as, like, roleplaying racism. like they really just want to call people slurs but don't have the opportunity because it's socially unacceptable.it also is, paradoxically, humanizing a computer program (which was actually kind of the point of it's original use in Star Wars media). and in doing this, you're also entirely shifting the blame off of the actual parties who are doing the harm: the companies who are building mountains of data centres that drive up the energy cost in communities and RAM prices worldwide while plagiarising every single thing that they can get their hands on including through means of mass piracy, and the users who choose to use these services despite the egregious ethical violations that the companies commit.
I hate AI. I don't hate any specific group of people for reasons outside their control. Believe me or don't on that one.
My goal wasn't really to start an argument, either, which might happen if I started going into detail about the necessity of direct action to disable, dismantle and destroy data centers that cause so many problems. I certainly have a lot of opinions about that one, I'm just trying not to soapbox too hard. I absolutely loathe these data centers and all the problems building them has caused. I don't think that calling AI programs clankers is shifting blame any more than calling B1 Battle Droids clankers is shifting blame away from the CIS, Dooku and Palpatine for starting the war in the first place.
I wonder if the next news update will be a restriction on calling AI clankers.
donovan_dmc said:How about a more specific "if you can't afford that artist you don't need art from them"
There are commissions for as little as $5 or even $1 out there, and I'm sure even less where the buying power of the local currency makes $20 a months payLooking at artists charging hundreds of dollars for commissions, then using being unable to afford that as a justification for perpetuating theft doesn't make sense
I think the next time I commission art it'll be some anti-AI stuff. That'll be fun!
dba_afish said:
in my view, people who use "clanker" have always come off as, like, roleplaying racism. like they really just want to call people slurs but don't have the opportunity because it's socially unacceptable.
'Clanker' is corny but suggesting that using the term at all is a secret outlet for actual ethnic hatred is funny af.
oneohthrix said:
'Clanker' is corny but suggesting that using the term at all is a secret outlet for actual ethnic hatred is funny af.
You could see it as a sort of allusion to how humans are being directed to serve technology rather than technology serving humans.
oneohthrix said:
'Clanker' is corny but suggesting that using the term at all is a secret outlet for actual ethnic hatred is funny af.
you must've not seen all those TikTok videos where people literally roleplay scenarios of themselves, enacting racial violence except they replace the slurs with ones for robots and all the racial references were similarly unsubtly recontextualised.
dba_afish said:
you must've not seen all those TikTok videos where people literally roleplay scenarios of themselves, enacting racial violence except they replace the slurs with ones for robots and all the racial references were similarly unsubtly recontextualised.
The amount of slurs for ai I’ve seen that are just repurposed ethnic slurs is actually insane.
oneohthrix said:
'Clanker' is corny but suggesting that using the term at all is a secret outlet for actual ethnic hatred is funny af.
The term has been used as a stand-in for African Americans in skits that replaced them with robots.
So yeah, I wouldn't be normalising the use of slurs in everyday speech, regardless of intent or target.
thegreatwolfgang said:
The term has been used as a stand-in for African Americans in skits that replaced them with robots.
"Moya Bailey, a professor at Northwestern University who specializes in the representation of race and gender in the media, says the anti-Black subtext to some clanker skits suggests that some are using the term as a justification for racist jokes."So yeah, I wouldn't be normalising the use of slurs in everyday speech, regardless of intent or target.
If I'm told not to use it on this site, then I won't use it on the site. But off-site, I'm not going to censor a term used to criticize AI simply because some people can't handle hearing it. Yes, racists have used it for scumbag reasons, but they use a lot of things for scumbag reasons. I don't let racist losers decide what I can or can't do or say.
Rather than censor language, a better way to go about things is to attack the roots of ethnic hatred through measures like education and exposure to different groups. The best way to make someone not prejudiced against a given demographic is to expose them to them.
Also, you missed some pretty critical context here.
"Jacob tells WIRED the parallel between his skit and racial segregation in the US is intentional.
“ It's pretty obvious what it's based off of, in terms of the historical standpoint, like everything that was happening in the 1950s and such with the Jim Crow laws and stuff,” he says. “I thought it was a funny idea of ‘history repeats itself sometimes,’ but at least it would be against robots.” He adds that while he’s engaging in a “little bit of rage-baiting,” he doesn’t take the skit seriously nor does he hold the beliefs portrayed. The backlash, he says, is likely to remain a part of what he does and is “ something I gotta learn to deal with and just move on from.” Potenza declined WIRED’s request for comment."
On TikTok, people defending the trend argue it’s not an example of racism because it's depicted in the context of a make-believe universe in which humans aren’t being targeted. “It’s not that deep” is a comment that is commonly thrown around under videos dissecting the seemingly racist references in clanker videos.
“ I didn't think too deeply about this,” Jacob says. “I was pretty much riding the trend like a lot of other creators were. Now it's slowly died out, and I'm just going to keep moving on to the next thing. I don't think people should harp on it any longer or give anymore energy to it. Don't want to keep perpetuating it into something bigger than it needs to be.”
Stewart says he’s bothered that people used his skits to provide cover for the offensive ones.
“ What got me more upset than anything was people were justifying it by saying, ‘[Stewart] is Black and he made clanker videos, so what's your problem?’” he says. “ I was poking fun of the fact that if things got really that advanced, how would we deal with it? It's not supposed to be a racist thing.”
Bailey also points out that racism within the AI industry goes as far as the actual methods used to power it. She references the negative health impact of xAI data centers in a Memphis neighborhood called Boxtown, which is 90 percent Black, as an example of environmental racism inflicted by the AI industry.
Though not all clanker videos are offensive, Bailey says people should carefully consider the tropes and references they’re using to take an anti-AI stance. “Jokes create an in-group and an out-group,” she says. “That's part of what makes it humorous, is like, ‘I get this. We're on the same team, we're on the same side.’ And so I think people really need to take some time to think through who it is that they're aligning with when they say that certain things are funny.”
You can certainly disagree with him, but he deserves the chance to explain his perspective, too. And hey, check out this comment on that article!
"Smart of the AI industry to tie racism to anti-AI terms knowing that many will be forced to find other ways to denounce AI."
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fuzzy_kobold said:
And, while I understand the hate for AI art, and I am staunchly pro-real-artists; Some people just don't have the disposable income to pay an artist. So an artist is not losing all that $0 from those people.
And being openly hostile to ALL AI art sends the message 'I will treat you like shit for being poor'.
Just saying... I learned to draw because I didn't have the disposable income to pay artists. :y
I've never been a fan of the "but poor people" argument that AI enjoyers like to use because I am the kind of person that argument is defending and I literally just learned to draw. If you can afford to randomly generate images of furry boobs you can afford to learn to draw furry boobs. Some of the best and most capable art programs out there are free (Krita, Blender, Libresprite), and if you don't have a computer you can borrow a pen and some paper from your local library or steal them from your workplace. There's plenty of free learning resources online too.
This is (part of) what makes it hard for me to believe AI enjoyers actually care about art. If they truly wanted to express themselves through art they would have the conviction to learn to do so. It is fundamentally impossible for a randomly generated image to communicate something from your mind the same way a hand-made image does.
strahaspilot said:
"Smart of the AI industry to tie racism to anti-AI terms knowing that many will be forced to find other ways to denounce AI."
Is it the AI industry doing that? A big component of fantasy and sci-fi races in stories has been to explore real world racism in more palatable ways, and there have been discussions well before AI about how far fantasy racism can be taken before it starts feeding back into the same problem it's trying to dissect.
Relatedly, using overly charged language in discussing a distaste for AI can have the opposite effect than you intend. Rather than making people go "They must really dislike AI for some valid reason to talk about it that way", they're more likely to go "That sounds irrational, I don't want to associate with that, it's probably not that bad". And who would benefit from people thinking that way? Not to get too conspiratorial, but I wouldn't be surprised if AI companies are at least fine with that fire getting stoked to such an extreme degree, if not helping stoke it themselves, so that more moderate people drift toward being accepting of AI to avoid associating with such ardent anti-AI people.
eightoflakes said:
This is (part of) what makes it hard for me to believe AI enjoyers actually care about art. If they truly wanted to express themselves through art they would have the conviction to learn to do so. It is fundamentally impossible for a randomly generated image to communicate something from your mind the same way a hand-made image does.
There's two big category of grief against AI at the moment: The technology, and how the technology has been rolled out.
Hands down, the technology has been rolled out in the worst way possible, unethically, without care for who's getting bulldozed over.
But here you're talking mostly about the technology itself:
What is really hard for me to understand is why AI enjoyers need any reasons at all? It's the same debate when art moved from traditional medias to computer graphic medias all over again; Some prefer oil painting over computer graphics and that's ok. By which objective measure can you measure how someone cares or not about art?
Yes, there's a lot of trash, but that's also true in traditional medias too and no one bats an eye about it.
I spend enough time on ai-generated art sites to know there's a lot of inspiring and expressive art pieces made with AI.
oneohthrix said:
'Clanker' is corny but suggesting that using the term at all is a secret outlet for actual ethnic hatred is funny af.
I guess it makes more sense than hearing the term 'canner' on the movie I, Robot.
kaleth said:
What is really hard for me to understand is why AI enjoyers need any reasons at all?
In my experience, it's because they want to feel like they created something when using AI. They need to justify AI image generation as some legitimate art tool, like a canvas with paints or a paint program, and anyone that's against it is just a Luddite against new technology. When they really treat it more as little more than a glorified free commission machine. If they acknowledge it for what it is, it would expose the problems they try to deny or downplay, so they have to find reasons to try to justify it as being more than that.
watsit said:
Is it the AI industry doing that? A big component of fantasy and sci-fi races in stories has been to explore real world racism in more palatable ways, and there have been discussions well before AI about how far fantasy racism can be taken before it starts feeding back into the same problem it's trying to dissect.Relatedly, using overly charged language in discussing a distaste for AI can have the opposite effect than you intend. Rather than making people go "They must really dislike AI for some valid reason to talk about it that way", they're more likely to go "That sounds irrational, I don't want to associate with that, it's probably not that bad". And who would benefit from people thinking that way? Not to get too conspiratorial, but I wouldn't be surprised if AI companies are at least fine with that fire getting stoked to such an extreme degree, if not helping stoke it themselves, so that more moderate people drift toward being accepting of AI to avoid associating with such ardent anti-AI people.
If you want to play respectability politics with the datacenters poisoning our air, polluting our water and driving up the costs of electricity and hardware, that's fine. But I'm not going to. People rally around symbols and language more than anything else, and using them rather than, say, some inevitably flawed leader we idealize will get a lot more done. If someone freaks out because I said clanker rather than actually accept the massive problems AI is causing, I'm not going to be able to win them over, anyway, and I'm really not concerned with their opinion. Construct whatever made up character of the Reasonable Moderate getting alienated because I said clanker that you want, I'm more focused on telling the truth.
Policing people's language rarely accomplishes anything in the long run.
colinthelucario said:
I guess it makes more sense than hearing the term 'canner' on the movie I, Robot.
It makes me wonder if people would have a problem with me saying greenskin, or xenos, or knife ears.
watsit said:
In my experience, it's because they want to feel like they created something when using AI. They need to justify AI image generation as some legitimate art tool, like a canvas with paints or a paint program, and anyone that's against it is just a Luddite against new technology. When they really treat it more as little more than a glorified free commission machine. If they acknowledge it for what it is, it would expose the problems they try to deny or downplay, so they have to find reasons to try to justify it as being more than that.
Here the crux of the disagreement: AI image generation is a legitimate tool. Infinitely more complex than a Smart Patch Brush, or a Clone brush, or an edge detection filter, but a legitimate tool nonetheless. There is a creative process; what's the difference between drawing stick figures in a notebook margin and typing instruction for the AI-blackbox?
kaleth said:
Here the crux of the disagreement: AI image generation is a legitimate tool. Infinitely more complex than a Smart Patch Brush, or a Clone brush, or an edge detection filter, but a legitimate tool nonetheless. There is a creative process; what's the difference between drawing stick figures in a notebook margin and typing instruction for the AI-blackbox?
Is AI a useful enough tool to justify all the negatives associated with it? All the hardware prices skyrocketing, the massive bubble that's inevitably going to collapse because there's just no profit model, the methane generators making our climate less and less livable, the water poisoned with runoff? The deepfakes and CSAM on Grok? The disinformation spread via certain political figures editing with it? Even from a perspective of pure self-interest, it's incredibly damaging to society for little to no gain.
I still think it's absolutely absurd that people are more concerned with me saying clanker than this demon tech ruining this hellworld even further.
strahaspilot said:
/snip
You really need to chill
donovan_dmc said:
Good, we don't need to actively advertise that an ai version of the site exists
Personally I feel this site should be open about e6ai's existence. Not out of endorsement of the medium, but for transparency that people who own this site actively choose to run that space.
Trying to hide it's existence would just make people's shock that it does exist all the more potent. You'd be surprised how many times already I've seen people be bewildered that it exists when talking about their grievances with this site on social media. So, why try to hide it? If there are people out there that would view that place's existence as dealbreaker, they should know about it, rather than having to find truth randomly from a social media thread or forum posts like these.
So yeah, I agree with OP. Maybe not in the literal "make it a deletion reason" unless it's someone posting AI gens without deceiving people on purpose. But... Just make it more apparent in general. Link it official. Anything, really. Just be more open about the sites the owner's are content to own.
Hello, Thank you all for your comments. I didn't intend to start arguments. I was ignorant to some of the facts and strong opinions against AI.
Years ago: horse and cart,steam engines, the automobile, airplanes, space travel. Back then things were made by hand, then machines/tools were invented to do the work. Many times resulting in a better product. Art evolved much the same, from charcoal on cave walls to paint on canvas, paint/drawing programs on computers, and now AI; it's just evolution. AI is just another tool created to do the work. Like using a brush or a spray gun, one may leave brush strokes, the other faster and may run. Users shouldn't "hate" each other for the tools they choose. AI threatens, to remove the human element,"the soul" of creating art; making it too easy. One will never completely replace the other, but AI is the unstoppable future.
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kaleth said:
Here the crux of the disagreement: AI image generation is a legitimate tool.
I don't think anyone would argue that AI isn't a tool, but AI image generation isn't creating art, it's not an art tool like a paint brush or art program is, for you to create art with. AI image generation is a tool to generate an image by mish-mashing other images together, and what you do with the generated image is a separate thing.
kaleth said:
There is a creative process; what's the difference between drawing stick figures in a notebook margin and typing instruction for the AI-blackbox?
The same difference as being an artist vs being a commissioner. There is some skill involved in being able to effectively describe what you want to an artist or AI for them or it to produce what you want, but neither of those make you an artist no matter how closely the result matches what you wanted.
EDIT:
strahaspilot said:
If you want to play respectability politics with the datacenters poisoning our air, polluting our water and driving up the costs of electricity and hardware, that's fine. But I'm not going to.
Who do you think has the ability to deal with all that? Who are those people going to listen to and follow? It would be nice if people in power would notice these problems for themselves and take action on their own, but that's rarely how things go. If you want people to listen to you, you need to make them want to listen, and coming across as an unreasonable extremist isn't conducive to that.
strahaspilot said:
People rally around symbols and language more than anything else, and using them rather than, say, some inevitably flawed leader we idealize will get a lot more done. If someone freaks out because I said clanker rather than actually accept the massive problems AI is causing, I'm not going to be able to win them over, anyway, and I'm really not concerned with their opinion. Construct whatever made up character of the Reasonable Moderate getting alienated because I said clanker that you want, I'm more focused on telling the truth.
Tell that to Richard Stallman. As much as he's been proven right time and again in regards to the current and coming problems in the computing landscape, barely anyone (certainly no one with any real pull) listens to him because he acts like/is an extremist that doesn't mince his words. He may have kicked off the free software movement, but the few successes we've managed to get in the mainstream have been despite him, not because of him.
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watsit said:
EDIT:
Who do you think has the ability to deal with all that? Who are those people going to listen to and follow? It would be nice if people in power would notice these problems for themselves and take action on their own, but that's rarely how things go. If you want people to listen to you, you need to make them want to listen, and coming across as an unreasonable extremist isn't conducive to that.Tell that to Richard Stallman. As much as he's been proven right time and again in regards to the current and coming problems in the computing landscape, barely anyone (certainly no one with any real pull) listens to him because he acts like/is an extremist that doesn't mince his words. He may have kicked off the free software movement, but the few successes we've managed to get in the mainstream have been despite him, not because of him.
Certain politicians, I guess. That, or anyone with the knowledge to build incendiary devices and the willingness to engage in direct action. (This is a joke, don't actually do that.) Again, not trying to soapbox, but I'm definitely keeping AI policy in mind when I go vote. Nor do I have any desire to be a public figure, so those standards are quite different for me. I have no obligation to be media friendly and not use certain words solely because you dislike them.
Stallman has been a massive influence on the free software movement and computing in general. What people think of him or how popular he is isn't relevant to that at all. Honestly, I respect him for having principles and living by them, since few people are as dedicated as he is. In fact, I'd argue most people use software he wrote or otherwise contributed to without knowing it, given how Linux uses the GNU coreutils and Linux is absolutely everywhere. If he had done as you seem to think he should have and decided not to loudly criticize the negative consequences of proprietary software, he wouldn't have accomplished as much as he has.
(Incidentally, Stallman has a public E-mail so if you'd like, feel free to send him a message saying he should be more of a reasonable moderate. I'd love to see how that works out.)
Again, play the Enlightened Centrist Reasonable Moderate if you want. It's not going to accomplish anything. I'd love for you to prove me wrong by getting these datacenters shut down with your balanced, even doctrine, but I've seen this rhetoric so many times before. It doesn't work. It doesn't change anything. All it ends up doing is derailing and deflecting any actual effort before anything actually gets done.
watsit said:
I don't think anyone would argue that AI isn't a tool, but AI image generation isn't creating art, it's not an art tool like a paint brush or art program is, for you to create art with. AI image generation is a tool to generate an image by mish-mashing other images together, and what you do with the generated image is a separate thing.The same difference as being an artist vs being a commissioner. There is some skill involved in being able to effectively describe what you want to an artist or AI for them or it to produce what you want, but neither of those make you an artist no matter how closely the result matches what you wanted.
I mean, the human brain does the same thing, extracting concepts and ideas from what you've been exposed to, then piecing together that knowledge in a certain way, and then producing and output.
I concede that the output is made of concepts learnt by the AI, not the individual. That and the raw output is not linked to the individual's skill. But it is a way to express oneself's creativity, and learning to write prompts is a skill. And for those that goes beyond the production of slop and produce stunning work also needs skills. And in my book that's what art is: expression of one's imagination through skill.
Anyway, we both know we won't see eye-to-eye on that subject and it's perfectly fine with me.
I want to express my sincerest thanks for having that discussion with me. I hope there's no hard feeling, and feel free to poke me if I can help with things we are not at odds
I think this has run its course.
