The other day I created content by hand-hacking some AI generated images, the usual "photo enhancement" job. The only difference was the original was generated by Stable Diffusion, not some horny human artist or photographer.

Y'all FLAMED me for "using AI".

Ok, 2 points, etc.:

1.) I'd missed the memo back in November when FA admin decided to ban all AI-generated content. So grace, friends. You can see my last journal post was FIVE YEARS AGO. Yes, as a matter of fact: I HAVE been living "under a rock" lately. I only weeks ago discovered stable diffusion was a thing and days ago got it running to abysmal results on my own computer. Me with a stray copy of stable diffusion is as of this writing zero threat to any artist's career.

2.) You cannot ban the evolution of technology. You can only ban yourself from the greater world community that's moving on with it. This applies to the Federal Reserve Bank's war on cryptocurrency, equally true about Fur Affinity's ban on generative neural networks, and it will be true of any ban on genetic engineering. Because y'all know some horny nerd like us is going to try to cook up an illegal nekko waifu in his mother's basement and the thing's going to get loose with a gene drive and force-evolve the whole planet to feline. You cannot stop the inevitable with laws and all laws attempting to do so are...unwise and short sighted. Better to embrace and adapt rather than exit and atrophy.

etc.) I am an ancient software engineer, from the days when we were first called "programmers". Seriously most of my career has been in writing Fortran code. I've watched AI, really "neural networks" grow from obscure academic papers from the 1960's to today's apparently "singularity" event with chatGPT (which I use and abuse daily), stable diffusion, Dall-E and all the like. I understand what it can do and what it can't.

It can't generate "ex-nilo", out of nothing. It won't solve problems nobody's ever solved before. All it can do is rehash the material and solutions it's been fed and strain you the purified "optimal". It's an optimizer, and that's all. And yes that's a huge force multiplier for anyone with a paperwork or artistic axe to grind. The smart ones use tools. And if you're not using AI in your career--ANY career-- you're now obsolete. You will be massively outpaced by those who do. Its not about taking jobs. Its about enhancing productivity and reducing time and labor costs. The machine is still dumb as a box of rocks and always will be. It has zero initiative and zero actual imagination as to what to do next. For those things a human will always be required.

Then there's the "rights violations" of folks who can't tell what part of which end of the output came from where. They're worried the machine will Borg their best efforts and spread them all around the world for free. Dude. Stop. It's called "marketing". Roll with it. You should be honored that the optimizer pulled out chopped-up bits of your work to include in its optimal "smoothie" answer. Hall back the output and rehash it yourself. Point to it everywhere with neon arrows that say "invented here! Want more original work like this inquire within!" Use your market as feedback to optimize your work product. The AI just drastically reduced the cycle time. If you're starving then get involved in crypto/blockchain projects that pay contributors in microtransactions to upload their training data. They exist. They've existed for years. Get educated about them.

Because frankly most of us here will be ignored as training data. "Optimal" we ain't. So it's a moot point. I've seen the results when the AI is trained on us, the default models generically trained on generic free images. It's...just us, usually mutated beyond recognition. It takes dedicated efforts to curate kwality training data and those who do should be praised for it and rewarded with our not-wasted attentions for their efforts. If more did we'd sooner get to the bottom and consensus of what "beauty" lies in the collective eyes of we the beholders.

Meanwhile there's me and my pickle. I've got DA that's rigged for full AI metadata and welcomes all commers--but has trained Nazi censorship robots to eliminate all futa material. And I've got FA who doesn't give a flying foreskin about futa--but has banned AI generated images in whole or part--fair use be damned. There's just no place left to post my latest material. I like futa and why should I even bother anymore with "non-optimized", human-generated fodder for my Photoshop mods when the optimized stuff is exactly as it says on the tin: optimized.

I call the AI "Tinkerbell". Because it slaps that fairy dust sh!t on everything. And yes she can write flawless Fortran code too.

Anywho this marks the FOURTH time I'm having to take my Tinkerbell and go home from FA or DA because of something irreparably stupid either on my part, the community, or the admins.

I can't say there won't be a fifth...if I live that long.

I'll see y'all when FA pulls its head out'a its arse and realizes they've just burned their own pants off. I give it a year or two. I been horny for 40 so no big to me. I just keep doin' my thing with Tink n' shovin' it down my pants while I wait. She and I together do make some surprisingly sparkly smut. I ain't missin' out on much.

Y'all are tho, if y'ain't doin' likewise.

Second star to the right and train the AI 'till morning.

-Paw.