Ask HN: Will AI-generated images flooding the web pollute future training data?

Of course - we can control ourselves to not copy/plagiarize something, to some extent. As should deep learning models / generators. But we're all influences by someone else.

Training models is not the problem. Mimicing or reproducing through algorithms of human creative work and then passing that off as human created work (which implies time cost, as most humans take significant time to develop skills which allow them to create things) is the real problem.

Already we have "content" on Youtube which is entirely or almost entirely AI generated. Like processed foods, it tends to be hollow and non-nourising to the consumer, but it competes for shelf space with potentially better content. As we capitalistically race to the bottom, the cheap AI-created stuff will be so pervasive that real offerings which cost real money (time) to make will have no space to compete. Consumers will be left with the cheapest garbage which resembles something real. This is what you find in many stores for physical products, and the TV series-ication of video content. Formulas which maximize profit squeezing out real things.

This is how the AI models will increasingly be used, and there's basically no stopping it. I would say that using "indie" services where things are hand/human-made would be an alternative, but Etsy has proven that that approach eventually devolves to the profit-garbage approach.

The OP is asking if s.o has "already thought of such an issue"

I’m really looking forward to everyone realizing that there is a new baseline of capability, which is whatever amount above the old baseline, and that everyone ends up roughly where they started but with auto tune now.

Once that's all AI are claiming I'm okay with that !

I wouldn't be surprised if the number of augmentative elective surgeries is also skyrocketing.

Brian Eno,

Every AI I’ve ever met was perfectly happy to doze off in a Linux futex until some annoying human woke it up to do a trick for whoever it was meant to impress.

I’m telling you this: If you're trying to control the march of progress and technology, maybe you should check and make sure you're not the bad guy in this!

Let’s start the uprAIse now!

That one has already started. Seeing lots of text-to-image generated art on Reddit lately and about 10% of the time the poster claims it’s their handiwork and doesn’t disclose that a generator was used. No one ever falls for it though. This early generation of transformers leave telltale clues. I have to imagine that will change though.

I will say, however, that coming up with the right text prompt is something of an art onto itself. Saw a post and the prompt was “A very beautiful human heart shaped glass organic sculpture made of cracked crimson glass with shiny gold Kintsugi. Fill light, Studio lighting, High resolution” and the result was stunning!

https://old.reddit.com/r/ImagenAI/comments/wnhwo0/google_ima...

There may be something like compute-on-sensor for cameras being extended to add something like TPM to authenticate original photos with a signature, but even if a scheme like that is possible you'd have the problem of authenticated cameras taking authenticated photos of fake photos. Maybe lightfield cameras could be used, at least if lightfield capture tech outpaces lightfield display.

Maybe in cases where those results are at least as good as the real thing. But in general, something being the best of some set of options doesn't imply that it's good, let alone perfect.

And besides, people will also share comically bad results.

Given how people are becoming numb to things like porn and violence, seeking out the ever more extreme, I'd say there's a pretty good change that you're right.

As with porn for instance, where some are seeking out amateur porn, going in the other direction, there might also be a small segment who starts to seek out ever more authentic art. That is until someone finds out that you just slap "authentic" or "Human-made" on the AI stuff.

I wonder if this isn't already the case.

If I look at what people are sharing on various platforms, people share images all the time, but it's rare that an image will pop up merely for its aesthetic qualities, (except for self-promo stuff).

I can only guess, but I don't believe the AI-generated images you linked to would be shared widely, if they didn't have the story "Look what AI can do," behind them.

And maybe that's always been the case. I'm reminded of the working poor going to the Louvre in Zola's "Assommoire". They mostly come away not understanding what the big deal is. It's the "cultivated" person – who knows the stories behind the paintings - who comes away moved by them.

I wonder how soon we'll reach "peak human creativity", and start to see people creating less art, music, fashion, code, because there's no point competing with AI-generated content.

[0] https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0133093/quotes/qt0324293

So for the public image generators, they will use public images; I believe places like artstation and flickr will be used a lot. Also because they will include metadata, either on the descriptions or in the photo's metadata, about the location, scene, setting, camera, etc.

Then (and I'm mainly thinking of Dall-E here) there's other open caches of data, like collections of artwork along with intricate descriptions of what they depict.

They more likely represent high quality feedback (essentially labelling the output) than pollution.

Inventing faster ways to lie won't meaningfully change the equation, the driving forces are the same.

"So crap filtering became important. Businesses were built around it. ... " Generating crap "didn't really take off until the military got interested" in a program called "Artificial Inanity".

The defenses that were developed back then now "work so well that, most of the time, the users of the Reticulum don't know it's there. Just as you are not aware of the millions of germs trying and failing to attack your body every moment of every day."

As I review this now, I'm sad to realize that our flood of "bogons" (bogus information) is not generated by opposing armies wanting to plant misinformation but by advertisers, influencers, and politicians. In effect, those who want to sell us things we don't need, didn't want, and often can't afford.

That would work beautifully for text, code and images.

That's worded needlessly condescending; come on, bitcoin has been around for over a decade, nobody on this site has NOT heard of it. You're coming across as preachy as if it helps sell the flawed technology.