A writhing mass of hands reaching up from the ground; they are pale and green, covered in dust, and many are distorted in some way indicitive of AI generation. There are also some glitch effects in the image.
Irony is crunchies using AI art to promote their wares

AI art is replacing local artists in the worst ways possible.

Published on : filed under "AI Apocalypse", by WFL

Opening disclaimer: I was initially OK with AI before it rose to prominence, but quickly shifted my perspective after I saw how it was being used, the costs of creation, and the overall fuckery of the industry.

Look, I'll still think AI image generation is fascinating from a technological standpoint.. But from an ethical - and well, everything else - perspective?

Fuck that shit.

What makes me sad is just the sheer amount of piss-soaked, community-consuming AI-generated shit being used by people who should know better and/or also have better options easily available to them.

I wasn't even planning on writing a blog today; It's my birthday weekend (buy me a coffee or something dammit), and I wanted to spend my morning working on some fun code and shopping for a new tie for Pride Prom this evening.

Instead, I saw a t-shirt for marathon that should not fucking exist.

Don't mistake me: The marathon itself is fine, even though my body is a broken funhouse mirror directed by David Lynch (RIP) and I can't run it myself.

No, my issue was with the art for the marathon on the t-shirt.

The obviously AI generated art.

Every regional marathon, fun-run and fundraiser I've seen for years has almost always done design contests for their promotional art; Sometimes there are prizes, other times it's just a fun way to flex as an artist. In some cases I'd get a little miffed that they don't actually give a reasonable payment/prize to artists, but something is better than nothing, at least.

Now they don't even bother working with real fucking artists and instead use AI-generated slop.

It gets even more skullfucked, though:

The local farmer's market and maker's markets are rife with AI-generated logos, signage and more..

..And these folks are almost stereotypically crunchy, as the kids used to say.

The irony of a bunch of green hippies fucking burning up the earth with AI-generated slop is as painful as the last time I had to piss out a kidney stone.

What in the fucking fuck is wrong with people?!