The only real news here is that Reddit mods are power mad tyrants, which is nothing new at all. AI generated art has just given them newer, funnier ways to be in the wrong.
Speaking on the topic of Reddit and mods and it's power structure:<p>In the UK Reddit has pushed a new subreddit called "HeyUK". It has turned up in the subscription feeds for some (all?) UK users automatically without the user asking for it or adding it. If you remove it from your list of subreddits the posts will still show up in your feed as "sponsored". As far as I can see this new subreddit is seeded with just cross posts from other UK subreddits and is created/pushed by Reddit itself.<p>The big issue I have is that this is just another subreddit with 15-odd random people who are the mods. These people have the unilateral power to shape discourse and be the arbiter of what is "UK" and what isn't.<p>Reddit is getting a bit too big, this feels very strange. On the swing-back we then have Reddit not banning the "jailbait" subreddit until it made major US news.<p>I have no idea what's going on with social media anymore, I'm just left with the overwhelming feeling that the people with the voice and the power are not the best of us.
Reddit's weird setup where essentially random people who were first "own" entire categories (= subreddits) of discussion is totally absurd.
What does it even matter how art is created?<p>It's the same with banning ChatGPT from StackOverflow: Who cares and who notices? Art is either evoking some feeling or not and it's different for everybody. An answer on SO is either helpful or not. Who cares how it was written? ChatGPT can easily say something more helpful than me, stable diffusion can easily make something I'd rather have on my wall than Da Vinci's Mona Lisa (or anything more along my preferences). Why do we care so much? What's "real art" anyway?<p>I always like a colleague's mousepad, it said: "Is this art or can we throw this out?" Always makes me smile.
This is /r/art by the way and based on the blurb and about section it seems less about art and more about fulfilling the deranged power fantasies of its moderators. What an unfriendly place.<p>Nice to hear the artist has gotten a more positive response in /r/drawing.
Those hands have the right number of fingers.<p>So either 1) It's not AI-generated art, or 2) It is AI-generated art and the artist is a master at prompting.<p>Either way they should be celebrated.
And that's the argument I've been making. Once you can't tell the difference between AI-made art and human-made art, the demand for human-made art will dramatically decrease, especially in the commercial areas.<p>If it takes a human a month to paint something beautiful, and 1 minute for AI, it's really hard to compete with AI.<p>The best we have is Midjourney V4, and it's getting quite close.
I'm not saying I agree with the actions of the mods, but there is a grain of truth in the "way of the world" remark.<p>Human artists who are just highly skilled executors of bad taste are going to be decimated by AI.
The hilarious irony is that the AI is quite possibly copying the authors older work if it was published on an image sharing site like Reddit or deviant art.<p>Lawsuits need to destroy these models stolen from the public.
That's just Reddit.. I don't think we should take any Reddit community. Seriously because it is run by Reddit mods who have proven countless times to be absolutely terrible at their job.
Even if true, AI is just another tool and combined work of artists and AI can produce greater art than the artist alone. For example, natural world has a lot of repeated elements and hand painting each one detracts from time that could be spent on more expressive aspects of the work. Airplanes let us fly further and faster than birds, should that be avoided / considered not to be real flight just because we are getting technological assistance?
On the topic of AI vs "real" art, I visited /r/artcommissions. I was surprised at how little people are asking, many in the range of $5-$50 for original work.
Notice how this is an unmanaged misuse of power. The artist has no legal tools to defend against the actions of this moderator.<p>An internet court is needed for these cases, like courts in the real world, and supported by them. And an internet police, which makes sure the court rulings are obeyed. Also supported by real world police, if necessary.
All digital artists need to do to prove that their art is not AI-generated is to record their screen and show a start to finish recording of themselves painting the digital image from scratch as proof.<p>This is not new and it is similar to speed painting, and all these prompters using Stable Diffusion cannot do such a thing.<p>Problem solved and job done.
Reminds me of the type of stuff r/Seattle mod u/careless would do<p><a href="https://www.seattleweekly.com/news/seattles-reddit-community-is-big-active-and-at-war-with-itself/" rel="nofollow">https://www.seattleweekly.com/news/seattles-reddit-community...</a>
If AI content is already this indistinguishable from normal content, how much normal content is "real content" anymore?<p>We have no metric or insight into this. The percentage will keep increasing as it's cheap and very economically beneficial for companies to use.
I’m glad. If your “art” can be mistaken for AI art, it’s likely just content, not art. The example picture is meaningless, just technical work. Makes no sense upon scrutiny.<p>True art is something that can’t be replicated by AI. You will have no doubt once you see it. It still exists even with the proliferation of AI art.<p>It’s like the difference between a random picture and a meme. The meme looks like a picture, but it captures an emotion or essential human truth that you connect with upon looking at it, where as a picture is just a random picture that could look like a meme but has no real meaning to it. You will know what I’m talking about.
I think this may be overreach by the moderator but I basically agree with their points. This looks just like a midjourney output. It is a hodge podge of different cultural influences -- asian character, with green eyes, with grecoroman garb, and eye of sauron orbs floating around her. It would have once been technically impressive, and now is just a kind of culture diarrhea.
I agree with the moderator, AI will push artists to their limits and force them to become creative which is the most important skill of an artist. Technicality isn't enough nowadays, doesn't matter if you can paint like Raphael, you need to be creative like Picasso or Dali.