Mastodawn

@davidaugust Uh, is that an AI image used to illustrate the quote?

edit: image has been fixed now, thanks!

Prof. Sam Lawler 3d ago

@unlambda @davidaugust I was going to say the same thing. What is up with those uh.... scissors?

@sundogplanets @davidaugust Yeah, it's clearly slop. Kind of a funny choice to illustrate a quote about "human dignity and the common good."

@unlambda @sundogplanets @davidaugust Ouch

@ai6yr @unlambda @sundogplanets

Edit: turns out it was AI, I messed up. Fooled and foolish. Sorry about that.

it is not slop! You make something of yourself when you assume.

I can see why you may have thought it was, but it is a stock photo put through a filter. I would not use AI for a post like this for reasons obvious.

https://mastodon.online/@davidaugust/116648640047858950

Prof. Sam Lawler 3d ago

@davidaugust @ai6yr @unlambda That is probably the thing I hate the most about the prevalence of slop AI images. They make me doubt EVERYTHING.

Thank you for this!

@sundogplanets @davidaugust @unlambda I suspect the "filter" you used is actually AI, as well. Which is typical nowadays. It's been asked to redraw the original image in a different style, and it's not "filtering", it's AI slopping it.

@ai6yr @sundogplanets @davidaugust @unlambda THIS.

Sara 3d ago

@ai6yr @sundogplanets @davidaugust @unlambda yeah, Canva is AI based

@sarae @ai6yr @sundogplanets @unlambda

now I know, so embarrassed I didn't fully get it before. Gonna have to purge my data from their systems.

Thank you.

Sara 3d ago

@davidaugust @ai6yr @sundogplanets @unlambda yeah, work is encouraging us to use it and I'm super unenthusiastic and trying to find workarounds

I don't think it gives the kind of professional impression I want to make with my work

@sarae @ai6yr @sundogplanets @unlambda

Yeah, we all are facing a tough moment where orgs/companies and others may encourage or require certain workflows that are made brittle or problematic by integrating systems with this stuff foundationally built in.

@davidaugust @sarae @ai6yr @sundogplanets Yeah, it's a bummer. It's being integrated into so many systems these days.

Thanks for being responsive to feedback!

@unlambda @sarae @ai6yr @sundogplanets

Happy to be responding, not so happy I got this way wrong and doubled and tripled down. Oops.

The problem was decidedly between the chair and the keyboard over here, I borked up, the call came from inside my cranium.

neville park 3d ago

@ai6yr @sundogplanets @davidaugust @unlambda yeahhh, that's an AI filter.

here's my version lmao (https://www.vatican.va/content/leo-xiv/en/encyclicals/documents/20260515-magnifica-humanitas.html#_chains_of_new_forms_of_slavery)

@ai6yr @sundogplanets @davidaugust It's even documented as such: https://www.canva.com/help/style-match/#why-does-my-photo-look-different-after-applying-a-style-

https://mastodon.online/@davidaugust/116648754565456420

@unlambda @ai6yr @sundogplanets Yeah. I borked up.

Prof. Sam Lawler 3d ago

@davidaugust @unlambda @ai6yr May I offer you a pile of super cute goats as a consolation prize?

@sundogplanets @unlambda @ai6yr

YES! Thank you. Quite welcome.

Still almost can't believe I not only got it wrong but I doubled and kinda tripled down on my wrong. Humiliation is mine, goats help.

Thank you very much!

https://mstdn.social/@AIFree/116518630216163799

Don't think you should feel bad about getting taken in by the slop merchants.

We live in interesting times where nothing may be what it seems. Kudos for making the situation clear once you realized what was going on.

Here's an AI Free label for your troubles to use on your next truly AI Free photography project.

Took this as a bit of an opportunity to boost the labels, but a serious issue is knowing the provenance of something like this filter. Wouldn't it be good if you had been able to choose filters attested to be AI Free from the get go, rather than it being a crap shoot?

@mastodonmigration @sundogplanets @unlambda @ai6yr that would be nice. I wish it had been more clear in their interface.

Would love to see this become more of a marketing thing. That is, people promoting that their tools are AI Free. Kind of like "organic" food products.

@mastodonmigration @sundogplanets @unlambda @ai6yr that would be great. I imagine there is already an appetite for it.

Feel like you experience here is a great case study justifying such an initiative.

@mastodonmigration @sundogplanets @unlambda @ai6yr

I agree.

I am debating if it might be good for me to write up my experience as an article of sorts for my https://stuff.davidaugust.com. Not sure yet if that is a good idea or exactly how to frame it.

David August

Stories, serious articles, satire, tech trends, how to guides and ideas from David August. Actor. Writer. Acting coach.

David August

Prof. Sam Lawler 2d ago

@davidaugust @mastodonmigration @unlambda @ai6yr Not quite the same thing, but I wrote up this article https://theconversation.com/an-astronomers-lament-satellite-megaconstellations-are-ruining-space-exploration-215653 after I found myself yelling swear words at the International Space Station, because it's a bright satellite, even though I used to be super excited about watching it. Made me realize my relationship with spaceflight had really dramatically changed thanks to for-profit tech companies, and writing it up helped me sort through that.

An astronomer’s lament: Satellite megaconstellations are ruining space exploration

Megaconstellations of satellites are hindering the most powerful tool for space exploration: telescopes.

The Conversation

@sundogplanets @mastodonmigration @unlambda @ai6yr thank you for this. I am still reeling a bit from my own mistake yesterday, but my enthusiasm for some tech, including space flight tech, has been in flux lately.

The entire framing and purpose of Artemis II highlighted for me the tarnishing effect of the corporate space race for me too.

And projects like Mastodon put in relief my shifting/shifted distemper about social media tech. An article may be starting to percolate for me.

novophx 22h ago

@sundogplanets @davidaugust @mastodonmigration @unlambda @ai6yr

100% Relatable. Great article. It's a tragedy something so full of hope and relative purity...that has been a beacon of progress and international peaceful cooperation in the name of science...transcending petty politics and violence has been corrupted by hyper-ego-greed driven corporations.

neville park 2d ago

@davidaugust @sundogplanets @unlambda @ai6yr hey, good on you for owning it!

I had to go months back in my camera roll to find anything even remotely uncontroversially cute so here's a burrowing bee poking its head out of its burrow lol

@nev @sundogplanets @unlambda @ai6yr Thank you! That's a good pick. I imagine it is like it is waking up for the bee.

@sundogplanets @davidaugust @ai6yr I'll see your goats, and raise you a couple of bunnies.

@unlambda @sundogplanets @ai6yr

😃 😃

IcooIey 3d ago

@davidaugust @unlambda @sundogplanets @ai6yr I appreciate this whole thread actually. Well done humans on detecting, correcting and forgiving. Adding a lupin to the goats and bunnies of forgiveness.

@IcooIey @unlambda @sundogplanets @ai6yr 😊 thank you!

@davidaugust @IcooIey @unlambda @sundogplanets @ai6yr

PeachMcD 2d ago

Thanks,everyone in this whole #Thread on #ThreadThursdays, for demonstrating/affirming once again the excellent reasons I left #Xitter behind for the more intelligent discourse enjoyed here in the #Fediverse
Solidarity from Tacoma
🇵🇸🕊

Here's a random kitten just for joy...

Rich Stein (he/him)3d ago

@davidaugust @unlambda @sundogplanets @ai6yr
Upping the ante — two cute dogs competing in synchronized sleeping.

From Robin with Love 2d ago

@RunRichRun @davidaugust @unlambda @sundogplanets @ai6yr
Also called the ‘double croissant’ position.🥐🥐

lizzzzard 2d ago

@unlambda @sundogplanets @davidaugust @ai6yr Guys, this thread is peak Mastodon. People mess up, realize it, are forgiven and even consoled, and cuteness ensues. This is what I'm here for, you all give me hope for humanity.

M Schommer 3d ago

@ai6yr
Well, yes. See for example the screw on the scissors to the left. No filter in the old sense of the word would come from the original photo to the "filtered" result.
@sundogplanets @davidaugust @unlambda

@sundogplanets @davidaugust @ai6yr @unlambda You should doubt. This image is sloppified heavily, regardless of whether a "filter" did it.

@liquor_american @sundogplanets @davidaugust @unlambda Yeah, looking at the original vs. the "filtered", it's sloppified. Unfortunate, and I know David did not do it deliberately... So easy for this to happen nowadays.

@ai6yr @liquor_american @sundogplanets @unlambda

Edit: turns out it was AI, I messed up. Fooled and foolish. Sorry about that.

it is not sloppified. I did not do so. Period.

It is an anomaly of the universe that human vision and cameras can easily encounter reality that does not seem real.

It is almost a visual version of a Tiffany-like problem: real does not always seem real ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiffany_problem ).

https://mastodon.online/@davidaugust/116648706889088224

@davidaugust @liquor_american @sundogplanets @unlambda I appreciate you and respect you, but I have to very much disagree... that tool is a Generative AI tool. The entire tool is AI, and all their graphics tools are generative AI, as well. It's very hard for many users to see that's what's happening under the cover :-(

@ai6yr @liquor_american @sundogplanets @unlambda

Yeah. I f-ed up.

https://mastodon.online/@davidaugust/116648754565456420

David August ❌👑 (@[email protected])

@[email protected] @[email protected] @[email protected] it didn't used to be....they had been a fairly traditional graphics package and I, obviously, engagingly and embarrassingly, didn't realize how deeply in their interface the AI had gone. My foolishness. This is gonna hang on me for a while. God F-ing damn it. So humiliating. Now to purge the drivel I foolishly spewed.

Mastodon

Trevor

3d ago

@davidaugust @ai6yr Those are some bizarre “scissors.”

@trevorparker @davidaugust Oooh, good call, AI slop. Unboosted.

@ai6yr @trevorparker

Edit: turns out it was AI, I messed up. Fooled and foolish. Sorry about that.

nope, processed stock photography, the scissors are occluded in the original, this is a filter on a stock photo. I found it as part of the Brown Black and White Modern Labor Day Instagram Post template on Canva. It is not AI:

@davidaugust @ai6yr @trevorparker What filter? It did some awfully slop-looking things to your image. Are you sure your filter isn't itself a bit sloppy?

On edit: The more I look, I'm increasingly convinced your filter *does* sloppify. It's introducing details that aren't in the original, and not just like visual anomalies. I mean look at how it "filtered" the tool in the far background that has no discernible detail. Or look at the snips in the fore. Same story, the "filtered" version has detail that does not exist in the original.

Your filter is not just transforming image information.

@liquor_american @davidaugust @trevorparker Filter is definitely AI redraw, it's slopping the original image, sadly. :-( And end user would not know this without careful inspection. Just out of curiosity, which filter is it?

@ai6yr @liquor_american @trevorparker

Edit: turns out it was AI, I messed up. Fooled and foolish. Sorry about that.

nope, again. It is a simple filter, no AI:

https://mastodon.online/@davidaugust/116648706889088224

@davidaugust @ai6yr @trevorparker My friend, have you investigated how "style match" in Canva works?

Edit.. from the horse's mouth: "Style Match is part of the Canva AI ecosystem" https://www.canva.com/help/style-match/

@liquor_american @davidaugust @trevorparker Yeah, this is AI restyling for sure... it's not traditional filtering , it's generative AI. You can take any photo from the web and "Copy art style" and it will regenerate your photo in that art style... i.e. Manga, etc.

@ai6yr @davidaugust @trevorparker You can draw a stick figure and have it create a character from it. No "filtering" can do that. Funny how they only acknowledge that it's AI at the very bottom of their how-to page.

@ai6yr @liquor_american @trevorparker what tghe actual F. DID I GET FAKED THE F OUT?!?!?

Why the F isn't it a filter like photoshop and other apps have had for decades. WHAT THE F!!!!!!!!

Did I really fuck up and stumble into using AI. GOD FU- *metaphorically throws laptop because I can;t afford to do that*

I better not run into anyone who works for Canva in the next hour..............

@davidaugust @liquor_american @trevorparker

Yeah, the whole company is a generative AI company. Sorry. That's their selling point and base technology.

https://www.canva.com/newsroom/news/magic-layers/

@ai6yr @liquor_american @trevorparker

it didn't used to be....they had been a fairly traditional graphics package and I, obviously, engagingly and embarrassingly, didn't realize how deeply in their interface the AI had gone. My foolishness.

This is gonna hang on me for a while. God F-ing damn it.

So humiliating. Now to purge the drivel I foolishly spewed.

@davidaugust @ai6yr @trevorparker Might be appropriate to further edit your original post at this point.

On edit: It's easy to get fooled. It's now incumbent on us not only to examine and understand our tools, but also to utterly distrust the makers of these tools who absolutely do not respect artists or their art.

@liquor_american @ai6yr @trevorparker

I have replaced the image and edited the original post. It may take time to propagate.

I messed up.