Raw LLM Responses

The reason there is a double standard is simple: People who cannot create with their own two hands will make any excuse they can- including trying to shame artists because "Artists reference things too" to justify what they do. Even if it's unethical, even if it's obviously wrong- "I get to create something, I can pretend to be creative". Which, yes we do reference things- however we're not directly sampling anything. We can reference ANYTHING though, a photo of someone else posing, a photo of ourselves posing, a pose-able figure, other's art as a pose- but then we make that original by layering our skill onto it. Take the pose and make it a character that's doing something neat, then put them in clothes, add effects. The AI isn't doing any of this through any creative means- it's 100% depending on what images it's gathered- images that the company nor the person hitting 'generate' have any right to. Just because it's online doesn't mean it's not-copyright, it doesn't mean it's fair game and it's not freakin' public domain. That's not how the damned internet works- but if you feel that is how it is? Do try to sell some Disney art you've found on line or generated. It's fair game right? There won't be any legal foot for Disney to stand on. What's more frustrating is these people using AI generation want to claim they're artists when they don't create anything, they're not doing, anything. It's like claiming you made food that you ordered at a restaurant- but then also ran out on the bill because you don't even pay/give credit to the people who made it. Even when an artist makes fanart there's still creativity happening, there's a lot you do that can make that piece YOURS (not in the legal ownership sense but the sense that I, made this and I, came up with this idea and rendered it in my, style.). There is no creativity happening with AI generation, it's a person asking the computer to make something for them and the computer does the rest. It's not art, it's not theirs and the computer isn't sentient so it's not being creative either. Before and after computers we never condoned tracing or plagiarism and this is why we don't condone AI art. Till Data from Star Trek walks onto a stage and paints something- from their OWN free will, their OWN creativity, it's not creativity. I get it, people want to make things, people want to do something interesting- but AI isn't the answer, you put the damned effort in, you learn how to make things yourself just like every other artists, musician, writer and so on. Wanting to create something isn't an excuse to use unethically sourced images and it's not your art. The AI-generation people can pretend all they want this is ego, it isn't- this is life. You want the job? You train to get the skill, you don't do it? You don't get the job. You want to make art? Get the skill.