Sarah McLaughlinMar 30, 2023

Boy do I have some thoughts about this CEO's quote in @drewharwell's great reporting on Midjourney.

1) THIS IS HOW YOU END UP WITH TOOLS THAT APPLY ONE COUNTRY'S AUTHORITARIAN RULES TO A GLOBAL AUDIENCE

2) He doesn't at all consider that Chinese people might also want to satirize Xi Jinping. Do they not matter?

3) "Minimize drama" is condescending nonsense. Being able to criticize one of the most authoritarian leaders in emerging tech is not a question of "drama."

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2023/03/30/midjourney-ai-image-generation-rules/

How a tiny company with few rules is making fake images go mainstream

Midjourney, the year-old firm behind recent fake visuals of Trump and the pope, illustrates the lack of oversight accompanying spectacular strides in AI.

The Washington Post
Show threadGraham Webster

@sarahemclaugh @drewharwell while we’re at it, China tech policy specialist here 🙋‍♂️

There’s no way this product is going to be doing business in China under the country’s forward-leaning rules on deep synthesis service providers. If they wanted to try, they would need to start build a whole censorship apparatus and possible start over with new training data. So it’s not like they’re protecting a revenue stream here.

Draft of the rules that have now been finalized https://digichina.stanford.edu/work/translation-internet-information-service-deep-synthesis-management-provisions-draft-for-comment-jan-2022/

Mar 30, 2023 at 4:22pmWeb