"Art is fundamentally human": FTC Creative Economy & Generative AI Discussion, 10/4 video/transcript
Last edited Sat Oct 7, 2023, 03:53 PM - Edit history (1)
The words quoted in the thread title are from FTC Commissioner Rebecca Slaughter, near the start of that roundtable.
This is something everyone here who's concerned about the threat generative AI poses to artists should listen to or read, because it collects a lot of the subjects and shows the viewpoints of artists I've been posting about on DU this year. And it was important for the FTC to bring these people together.
I found out about this from a TechCrunch article I ran across this morning: https://techcrunch.com/2023/10/06/creatives-across-industries-are-strategizing-together-around-ai-concerns/
“I know that generative AI in particular poses a unique set of opportunities and challenges to creative industries,” FTC Chair Lina Khan said. “We’ve already heard significant concerns about how these technologies could virtually overnight significantly disempower creators and artists who may watch their life’s creation be appropriated into models over which they have no control.”
In the comments, representatives from myriad creative communities expressed concerns around opt-out requirements that by default train AI models on artists’ original work, and how existing copyright law could be a useful if not comprehensive tool for setting out regulatory guardrails.
In the conversation, a representative with the WGA emphasized that while striking writers obtained their own protections in a newly-won agreement, the fight for artists’ livelihoods “doesn’t stop at the bargaining table.”
The article links to the FTC page with the video
https://www.ftc.gov/media/creative-economy-generative-ai-discussion-october-4-2023
and at first glance I wondered where the transcript was, since I wanted to skim it. But it isn't on the rest of the page, or on a separate page this one links to. It's accessed through the video embedded there, by clicking on the search icon showing a magnifying glass over a page. Clicking that opens the text of the transcript in the video window, with the video time for each couple of lines next to those lines. But like most quick transcripts, there are some errors. So I checked what I quoted below against the video.
We've had a couple of recent threads here both extolling and criticizing image-generating AI, which can create all sorts of images in seconds from prompts of just a few words, thanks to vast data sets of stolen images the AI models were trained on. So much more convenient, I'll admit, than taking the time to learn how to create real pictures yourself. Tempting for people who'd like to call themselves artists but not have to devote any real time or energy to learning basic skills and developing their own talent. But a disaster for REAL artists, whose livelihoods have already been hurt and whose occupations could be wiped out. And a disaster for art in general, as more and more young people feel there's little point in learning to create art themselves if machines trained on the world's art can spit something out in seconds.
There are two visual artists in this FTC discussion whom you should listen to. Karla Ortiz, whose comments start about 50:19, and Steven Zapata, whose comments start about 56:06 and continued through about 1:01:54.
"Art is fundamentally human," as Rebecca Slaughter said. She also said (quoting from the FTC transcript):
The value of creative arts to society is so fundamental that it is enshrined in the Constutution. You all are the humans who have mastered a craft, and you share it with all of us for the benefit of the public and society as a whole. In return, such works of art may be granted copyright protection. Copyright provides your livelihood and the ability to continue to create and promote further creation and learning....
As artificial intelligence processes, uses and applications evolve, we cannot lose sight of the fundamental truth that technology is a tool to be used by humans. Humans are not and should not be used by technology.
While emailing another DUer last night, I explained that as tempting as instant-fake-creativity tools like image generators are, I will not use them.
It would be like dancing on the graves of artists who were buried alive.
This FTC discussion gives you a chance to hear from some of those artists.
= new reply since forum marked as read
that longer reply.
And roll.
LOL! Love that! And I agree.
Using AI to appropriate the style and talent of another is a crime. Just as fraud always has been during the history of human creation.
The issue is very complex. It can be argued that there are those who would use AI to generate original works of their own.
Thanks for posting this very deep and thought provoking critical discussion of the matter.
I'm not sure how artists would really use AI to generate original works of their own, since I'd guess that would mean overriding everything the AI does and treating it as a simple digital art tool to be told exactly where each line/color/form should be. And regular digital art tools would be more useful for that, I'd think.
I agree that having AI appropriate the style and talent of another is horrible, especially when it takes almost no effort. I was disgusted to read months ago that either Microsoft or Google (think it was Microsoft but I've read and posted so many articles on Ai I'm not sure) chose to ignore the recommendation of their ethicists to make it impossible for users of their image generators to request a living artist's style in an AI image (and then they disbanded the team of ethicists as well). But even if an artist's name isn't used, requesting types of images associated with that artist will likely conjure up their style with AI.
It's a theft of intellectual property worldwide for the profit of a few companies.
My Dad was an artist. He did commercial art for a living, That could have been done by AI, but he painted portraits and still lifes for the joy of it. He loved his movie stars, and his Clark Gable captured not just Clark, but how Dad reacted to and admired him.
I can only sketch, but I am a long time photographer. My photos are art. I frame and expose them to express how the subject touched me. More limited than painting, but I put my heart into each one. They express the subject and me. Not pot-shots.
Nichiren, a Buddhist sage, said that the artist is in his or her work. And it shows. Like this work that people are raving about today. Nicholas Cage taking a tuna on board an airplane. I forgot if he flew into the WTC, as almost every character does these days.
I don't enter photo contests because my photos are art, and I'm part of them. Art isn't competitive to me.
My works and those of artists are expression.
Meaning is created as we process images (and words) with our senses, and based on our emotions and experiences.
Algorithms might capture an expression by accident, like the thousand (or miilion) proverbial monkeys at typewriters.
I would love to quote the preface to Joseph Conrad's "N***** of the Narcissus". I'll link a copy and quote a tiny bit. Only a brilliant writer could have written this and only a human can comprehend it, with their emotions and human experiences.
https://en.m.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Nigger_of_the_%22Narcissus%22/Preface
1897. J. C.
READ THE ENTIRE PREFACE (linked).
IT'S BRILLIANT.
Chores call. Later if I get an (unprompted) inspiration.
