GenAI Art Is the Least Imaginative Use of AI Imaginable

I bought a book a few years ago called The Artist in the Machine by Arthur Miller[0] and it covers a lot of early AI creativity. I wish they shelled out for more color pages, because I agree things like DeepDream and GAN art are very trippy and would have made it a great coffee table book. It's wild that it took just two or three more years for diffusion models to hit the scene and take the world by storm.

[0] https://direct.mit.edu/books/book/4547/The-Artist-in-the-Mac...

Deep dream! The eyes

Although the chatbot in chrome devtools is really useful. I selected a DOM node and ask "why isn't this visible" and it queried the DOM, css and figured out the height was 0 and explained exactly what lead to it being 0.

Google Photos just added this completely subpar feature for how I have to search my photos in the app. -.-

It's not the AI that makes the art, but the person who tells the AI what to do. A painter friend of mine has gotten into generative AI lately, and the sometimes-pretty, sometimes-intimidating pictures she comes up with sure look like an artistic expression to me. She has a vision of something she wants to see, and she uses tools to bring that vision into reality, just like she does with paint; the new tools just give her new options.

As far as I understand, art is typically understood to have two components: expression and impression. The creation of something, anything, as a form of self-expression, is considered art. Additionally, though, art is in eyes of the beholder. If a feeling is inspired in someone by the observation of a thing, act, etc, then it becomes art to them, in that moment. Notably, though, it doesn't necessarily make that thing art to anyone else, unless it is curated at which point that curation is a form of expression.

These definitions are distinct from the requirements for copyright.

> It’s possible for someone to make art from GenAI outputs, but that requires taking artistic liberties post generation.

Plenty of people use others' expressions as a form of art, (sharing song lyrics, singing others' songs in the shower, cat memes, and so on).

Kinda understandable, but as a consumer, I already dislike that a lot.

In the beginning, AI 'art' was novel and interesting in a way. But now I've already seen so much generic illustrations, and in 95% they don't add any value to a blog post. I'm even less likely to click on links with a generated thumbnail these days. It creates an expectation of SEO spam or low quality and I have to wonder if the author also used AI to write the text. The generated images seem so soulless to me.

The world is topsy turvy. I can't even tell satire anymore or whether people are being sarcastic and tongue-in-cheek. This comment reads like sarcasm to me, overdoing on the things currently crappy about online "content creation":

0. The word "content" itself and self-applying the "content creator" label. No writer, artist, or musician I know thinks of themself unironically as a "creator of content". How bland! Like a manufacturer! I produce units of content. My buddy who plays the saxophone and does a little composing would barf if you told him he was an audio content creator.

1. Feeding the algorithm. Do people really think about what "the algorithm" wants when they are being creative? Do they alter what they make to suit the algorithm? Why care what an unfeeling search engine wants if you're ultimately writing for the human soul?

2. Engagement as a goal. Is this really what you're after when you write? Not to inform, educate, please, inspire, upset, challenge, upend, or some other meaty goal? You just want some kind of generic "engagement"? This is the kind of thing a Marketing SVP wants, not a writer!

Sorry, I don't mean to attack. I'm trying to avoid being cynical, but the comment really struck me. I can't believe someone would write something like this about their creative passion, to the point where I question that maybe it was amazing sarcasm.

What you've described is the exact mechanism through which generative AI will actually kill search on the open web.

It's less likely that search will be threatened by the alternative of Q&A with a chatbot as much as by slop overrunning valuable content. More and more of the discoverable content will be machine-generated filler produced for exactly the reason you describe, it's rewarded by rankings.

People won't even bother writing on their own, let alone producing images to go with the writing. It'll be like the herculean task of just finding a damn recipe online without reading someone's life story first, but 1000x as bad. It's already here I guess. We've seen the baby peacocks in the coalmine.

Would you consider the images you create to be art?

This is not creating art, but illustration. Art is where the meaning is inherent to the work, whereas illustration is when it is derived from something else that it accompanies (e.g. a text). There’s obviously a spectrum here, but GenAI blogpost decoration are pretty much the terminal point on the illustration part of that scale.

Once I was an editorial illustrator, and the mantra always was "concept is king". Stick figures are kosher so long as they communicate something.

Impressionists emerged following the invention of the camera, as they had no more incentive to pursue realism. I think in the age of AI slop any form of crude image making is better so long as it's human. Scribble something out with crayons. Shape an animal out of a slice of bread, post a pic. It's all legit now, technical art abilities mean nothing. To impress you actually have to have a good idea.

Isn't it amazing when a good chunk of monetary incentive in the present day is directed towards the terrifying concept of "engagement"?

Use free stock photos instead. Your content will look less spammy.

What about NFTs as registrations for domain names a la ens.domains?

Absolutely

> I would really like an objective explanation of why this attitude "that the whole point of art is the process of making it" is anything but pretentiousness in it's purest form.

i think that's a problem - i am no philosopher or art historian, but i truly can't think of "objective" truths of any kind when i think about art, the process of making art, or the process of engaging with art. it's nice to make art. i play around with synthesizers and it... makes me feel more like a human being, i guess? when i record music or do amateur photography i've actualized myself somehow. something that wouldn't have existed otherwise now exists because of my actions, and that's enjoyable to experience. i imagine one could argue "you still created something that wouldn't have existed when you prompt an AI!" but it just doesn't feel the same, and i struggle to explain why

> And even if one supposes that a key part of the value is self-exploration

i think a lot of value is the context of the art itself - picasso going insane, the protests leading up to the tank man photo, aphex twin's cheetah, jesse krimes being in prison, whatever. maybe this is just me, but when i go to museums the extra information in the labels or audio descriptions is where i find most of the joy and fascination that makes the artworks meaningful to me. AI art feels contextless

> Surely the actual artifact itself has some value?

genuinely - have you encountered AI-generated art that you find valuable? that you tell other people about or have kept a copy of for yourself somehow?

> I would really like an objective explanation of why this attitude "that the whole point of art is the process of making it" is anything but pretentiousness in it's purest form.

It's not necessarily pretentiousness (though it's definitely pretentiousness adjacent), but a view from the point-of-view of an artist. I say it's adjacent to pretentiousness because I think implicit in the entire article is the assumption that creation is superior to consumption (and also the assumption that art created just to pay the bills is inferior to art created for its own sake[1]).

1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potboiler

“So what," the Chelgrian asked, "is the point of me or anybody else writing a symphony, or anything else?"

The avatar raised its brows in surprise. "Well, for one thing, you do it, it's you who gets the feeling of achievement."

"Ignoring the subjective. What would be the point for those listening to it?"

"They'd know it was one of their own species, not a Mind, who created it."

"Ignoring that, too; suppose they weren't told it was by an AI, or didn't care."

"If they hadn't been told then the comparison isn't complete; information is being concealed. If they don't care, then they're unlike any group of humans I've ever encountered."

"But if you can—"

"Ziller, are you concerned that Minds—AIs, if you like—can create, or even just appear to create, original works of art?"

"Frankly, when they're the sort of original works of art that I create, yes."

"Ziller, it doesn't matter. You have to think like a mountain climber."

"Oh, do I?"

"Yes. Some people take days, sweat buckets, endure pain and cold and risk injury and—in some cases—permanent death to achieve the summit of a mountain only to discover there a party of their peers freshly arrived by aircraft and enjoying a light picnic."

"If I was one of those climbers I'd be pretty damned annoyed."

"Well, it is considered rather impolite to land an aircraft on a summit which people are at that moment struggling up to the hard way, but it can and does happen. Good manners indicate that the picnic ought to be shared and that those who arrived by aircraft express awe and respect for the accomplishment of the climbers.

"The point, of course, is that the people who spent days and sweated buckets could also have taken an aircraft to the summit if all they'd wanted was to absorb the view. It is the struggle that they crave. The sense of achievement is produced by the route to and from the peak, not by the peak itself. It is just the fold between the pages." The avatar hesitated. It put its head a little to one side and narrowed its eyes. "How far do I have to take this analogy, Cr. Ziller?”

- Iain M. Banks, Look to Windward

You are exactly right, the artists are deploying all their rhetoric skills they learned in university to try to avoid becoming the next horse drawn carriage drivers.

The point of art for the artist is expression. The point for the audience is to gain something through shared experience with the artist.

AI outputs are not created by a conscious agent experiencing affect, and its audience shares an experience with no one. It's not compelling, and isn't art.

Photography is theft, especially when taken via point-and-shoot camera. Landscapes need to be painted, portraits need to be sketched etc. Art via photography is 'find and take'.