I wanted to discuss some of my ideas and worries on this issue since, based on my experiences thus far, I don’t believe it’s a cut-and-dry matter. While my own thoughts are more on the negative side, I have read arguments supporting it that have some weight.
As with most things, I try to see all sides in order to form my own opinion, and I urge you to do the same as you read on. This post is based on my ideas on the matter, although they are far from the only viewpoint that should be addressed.
I shouldn’t have to explain this, but for the sake of argument, I will. As a general generalization, many artists already deal with the idea that their work is undervalued. It already seems like we are always combating folks who expect to acquire unique art for the price of an IKEA mass-produced poster.
When you spend countless hours every day and years honing your craft, it’s understandable that it can be disheartening when something comes along that can potentially replace you with the push of a button. AI doesn’t need vacation time, a lunch break, or benefits; it won’t ask for a raise; and it won’t have a personal issue that makes for an unpleasant work relationship.
To complicate matters further, many AI-generating algorithms use previous artists’ work that is freely accessible on the internet to feed their algorithm and develop artwork. This is where the theft comes in. Some of the applications allow you to specifically instruct it to produce a picture of you in the manner of your favorite artist.
Depending on how well the software is, it may provide a believable render. So it seems that artists must now be concerned not just with watermarking their photographs on the web in the hopes that they are not stolen, but also with applications that can effectively imitate their aesthetic. Someone may even claim to be you and create phony works under your name.
One may argue that all artists are always affected by other artists’ work and steal from each other’s aesthetics. This is absolutely correct. But this becomes a problem if the apps that use it make money from it and take enough money away from the artists whose style is being copied. You may counter that most individuals, for example, will not go down that path anyhow. Since AI art is presently only available digitally, it’s not like you could sell a painting fraudulently under their name, right? I guess you could if you hired a decent enough copyist, but that’s another story for another day.
What if, for example, someone made a digital artwork that resembled the style of a renowned artist and then attempted to sell it as prints or an NFT? There are already concerns with social media identities that seem to be other individuals. What’s to stop them from duping folks into believing they’re buying from and supporting a favorite artist when they’re really giving their money to a swindler? They were not only robbed, but the artwork they bought did not have the value they expected.
It is almost impossible to stop technological progress so that “the robots don’t take our jobs.” Every day, new innovations are being developed to make things simpler or more accessible. When website templates were made available to a lot of people, I think web designers went crazy. Canva is still a terrible word for some graphic artists. The key to any of these “assistant” technologies is that the outcomes are often only as good as the human person utilizing them.