[oth001]

Does Google.com allow anybody to instantly mimic an artist's style? Obviously AI laws haven't been put in place yet - it doesn't mean it's not unethical.

[astrange]

It's always been possible to imitate an artstyle. Nevertheless, they've never gotten IP protection - they're more like trade secrets.

What's notable is "AI users are trying to copy an artist" != "AI has learned from an artist" != "AI has seen the artist's images in the first place". The most popular supposedly stolen-from artist Greg Rutkowski is not in StableDiffusion's training images, even though users are actively trying to copy him, it's a coincidence that it appears to work. Is that unethical?

Also, AI laws (text and data mining exemptions) /have/ been put in place - to make this explicitly legal!

[oth001]

Imitate, not duplicate. Hours of work/talent vs. stealing an artist's work (see: unlicensed) and feeding it into a software program to spit out a slightly different version (complete with watermarks and all)...

[astrange]

You don't have much faith in an artist if you think you can "duplicate their style" by looking at 4-5 512x512 images of their work.

> complete with watermarks and all

That's not the AI "copying their watermarks", it's the AI learning "sometimes images have watermarks" and giving them some of its own.

[version_five]

Does LAION do this? Regardless of whether "allow anybody to instantly mimic an artist's style" is bad, who are you complaining about?

[itishappy]

Is mimicking an artist's style considered unethical?