First off, I am sex positive, pro porn, pro sex work, and don't believe sex work should be shameful, and that there is nothing wrong about buying intimacy from a willing seller.
That said. The current state of the industry and the conditions for many professionals raises serious ethical issues. Coercion being the biggest issue.
I am torn about AI porn. On one hand it can produce porn without suffering, on the other hand it might be trained on other peoples work and take peoples jobs.
I think another major point to consider going forward is if it is problematic if people can generate all sorts of illegal stuff. If it is AI generated it is a victimless crime, so should it be illegal? I personally feel uncomfortable with the thought of several things being legal, but I can't logically argue for it being illegal without a victim.
I've found that there's a lot of things on the Internet that went wrong because it was ad supported for "free". Porn is one of them.
There is ethically produced porn out there, but you're going to have to pay for it. Incidentally, it also tends to be better porn overall. The versions of the videos they put up on tube sites are usually cut down, and are only part of their complete library. Up through 2012 or so, the tube sites were mostly pirated content, but then they came to an agreement with the mainstream porn industry. Now it's mostly the studios putting up their own content (plus independent, verified creators), and anything pirated gets taken down fast.
Anyway, sites like Crash Pad Series, Erika Lust, Vanessa Cliff, and Adulttime (the most mainstream of this list) are worth a subscription fee.
i have no problem with ai porn assuming it's not based on any real identities, i think that should be considered identity theft or impersonation or something.
Outside of that, it's more complicated, but i don't think it's a net negative, people will still thrive in the porn industry, it's been around since it's been possible, i don't see why it wouldn't continue.
Identity theft only makes sense for businesses. I can sketch naked Johny Depp in my sketchbook and do whatever I want with it and no one can stop me. Why should an AI tool be any different if distribution is not involved?
revenge porn, simple as. Creating fake revenge porn of real people is still to some degree revenge porn, and i would argue stealing someones identity/impersonation.
To be clear, you're example is a sketch of johnny depp, i'm talking about a video of a person that resembles the likeness of another person, where the entire video is manufactured. Those are fundamentally, two different things.
I guess the point is this enables the mass production of revenge porn essentially at a person on the street level which makes it much harder to punish and prevent distribution. when it is relatively few sources that produces the unwanted product then only punishing the distribution might be a viable method. But when the production method becomes available to the masses then the only feasible control mechanism is to try to regulate the production method. It is all a matter of where is the most efficient position to put the bottle neck.
For instance when 3D printing allows people to produce automatic rifles in their homes "saying civil use of automatic rifles is illegal so that is fine" is useless.
I think that's a fair point and I wonder how will this effect the freedom of expression on the internet. If you can't find the distributor then it'll be really tough to get a handle of this.
On the other hand the sheer over abundance could simply break the entire value of revenge porn as in "nothing is real anyway so it doesn't matter" sort of thing which I hope would be the case. No one will be watching revenge porn cause they generate any porn they want in a heartbeat. Thats the ideal scenario anyway.
It is indeed a complicated problem with many intertwined variables, wouldn't wanna be in the shoes of policy makers (assuming that they actually are searching for an honest solution and not trying to turn this into profit lol).
For instance too much regulation on fields like this essentially would kill high quality open source AI tools and make most of them proprietary software leaving the field in the mercy of tech monopolies. This is probably what these monopolies want and they will surely try to push things this way to kill competition (talk about capitalism spurring competition and innovation!). They might even don the cloak of some of these bad actors to speed up the process. Given the possible application range of AI, this is probably even more dangerous than flooding the internet with revenge porn.
%100 freedom, no regulations will essentially lead to a mixed situation of creative and possibly ground breaking uses of the tech vs many bad actors using the tech for things like scamming, disinformation etc. how it will balance out on the long run is probably very hard to predict.
I think two things are clear, 1-both extremities are not ideal, 2- between the two extremities %100 freedom is still the better option (the former just exchanges many small bad actors for a couple giant bad actors and chokes any possible good outcomes).
Based on these starting with a solution closer to the "freedom edge" and improving it step by step based on results is probably the most sensible approach.
sort of. There are arguments that private ownership of these videos is also weird and shitty, however i think impersonation and identity theft are going to the two most broadly applicable instances of relevant law here. Otherwise i can see issues cropping up.
Other people do not have any inherent rights to your likeness, you should not simply be able to pretend to be someone else. That's considered identity theft/fraud when we do it with legally identifying papers, it's a similar case here i think.
But the thing is it's not a relevant law here at all as nothing is being distributed and no one is being harmed. Would you say the same thing if AI is not involved? Sure it can be creepy and weird and whatnot but it's not inhertly harmful or at least it's not obvious how it would be.
the only perceivable reason to create these videos is either for private consumption, in which case, who gives a fuck. Or for public distribution, otherwise you wouldn't create them. And you'd have to be a bit of a weird breed to create AI porn of specific people for private consumption.
If AI isn't involved, the same general principles would apply, except it might include more people now.
I've been thinking about this more and I think one interesting argument here is "toxic culture growth". As in even if the thing is not distributed it might grow undesired toxic cultures througu indirect exposures (like social media or forums discussions) even without the direct sharing.
I think this is slippery to the point of government mind control but maybe there's something valuable to research here either way.
It can generate combinations of things that it is not trained on, so not necessarily a victim. But of course there might be something in there, I won't deny that.
However the act of generating something does not create a new victim unless there is someones likeness and it is shared? Or is there something ethical here, that I am missing?
(Yes, all current AI is basically collective piracy of everyones IP, but besides that)
Watching videos of rape doesn't create a new victim. But we consider it additional abuse of an existing victim.
So take that video and modify it a bit. Color correct or something. That's still abuse, right?
So the question is, at what point in modifying the video does it become not abuse? When you can't recognize the person? But I think simply blurring the face wouldn't suffice. So when?
That's the gray area. AI is trained on images of abuse (we know it's in there somewhere). So at what point can we say the modified images are okay because the abused person has been removed enough from the data?
I can't make that call. And because I can't make that call, I can't support the concept.
Assume you have exacting control of training data. You give it consensual sexual play, including rough play, bdsm play, and cnc play. We are 100% certain the content is consensual in this hypothetical.
Is the output a grey area, even if it seems like real rape?
Now another hypothetical. A person closes their eyes and imagines raping someone. “Real” rape. Is that a grey area?
Let’s build on that. Let’s say this person is a talented artist, and they draw out their imagined rape scene, which we are 100% certain is a non-consensual scene imagined by the artist. Is this a grey area?
We can build on that further. What if they take the time to animate this scene? Is that a grey area?
When does the above cross into a problem? Is it the AI making something that seems like rape but is built on consensual content? The thought of a person imagining a real rape? The putting of that thought onto a still image? The animating?
Is the output a grey area, even if it seems like real rape?
on a base semantic and mechanic level, no, not at all. They aren't real people, there aren't any victims involved, and there aren't any perpetrators. You might even be able to argue the opposite, that this is actually a net positive, because it prevents people from consuming real abuse.
Now another hypothetical. A person closes their eyes and imagines raping someone. “Real” rape. Is that a grey area?
until you can either publicly display yours, or someone else process of thought, or read peoples minds, definitionally, this is an impossible question to answer. So the default is no, because it's not possible to be based in any frame of reality.
Let’s build on that. Let’s say this person is a talented artist, and they draw out their imagined rape scene, which we are 100% certain is a non-consensual scene imagined by the artist. Is this a grey area?
assuming it depicts no real persons or identities, no, there is nothing necessarily wrong about this, in fact i would defer back to the first answer for this one.
We can build on that further. What if they take the time to animate this scene? Is that a grey area?
this is the same as the previous question, media format makes no difference, it's telling the same story.
When does the above cross into a problem?
most people would argue, and i think precedent would probably agree, that this would start to be a problem when explicit external influences are a part of the motivation, rather than an explicitly internally motivated process. There is necessarily a morality line that must be crossed to become a more negative thing, than it is a positive thing. The question is how to define that line in regards to AI.
Consensual training data makes it ok. I think AI companies should be accountable for curating inputs.
Any art is ok as long as the artist consents. Even if they're drawing horrible things, it's just a drawing.
Now the real question is, should we include rapes of people who have died and have no family? Because then you can't even argue increased suffering of the victim.
But maybe this just gets solved by curation and the "don't be a dick" rule. Because the above sounds kinda dickish.
With this logic, any output of any pic gen AI is abuse.. I mean, we can 100% be sure that there are CP in training data (it would be a very bug surprise if not) and all output is result of all training data as far as I understand the statistical behaviour of photo gen AI.
Well AI is by design not able to curate its training data, but companies training the models would in theory be able to. But it is not feasible to sanitise this huge stack of data.
It's not just AI that can create content like that though. 3d artists have been making victimless rape slop of your vidya waifu for well over a decade now.
AI doesn't create, it modifies. You might argue that humans are the same, but I think that'd be a dismal view of human creativity. But then we're getting weirdly philosophical.
I see the issue with how much of a crime is enough for it to be okay, and the gray area. I can't make that call either, but I kinda disagree with the black and white conclusion. I don't need something to be perfectly ethical, few things are. I do however want to act in a ethical manner, and strive to be better.
Where do you draw the line?
It sounds like you mean no AI can be used in any cases, unless all the material has been carefully vetted?
I highly doubt there isn't illegal content in most AI models of any size by big tech.
I am not sure where I draw the line, but I do want to use AI services, but not for porn though.
Watching videos of rape doesn’t create a new victim. But we consider it additional abuse of an existing victim.
is this a legal thing? I'm not familiar with the laws surrounding sexual abuse, on account of the fact that i don't frequently sexually abuse people, but if this is an established legal precedent that's definitely a good argument to use.
However, on a mechanical level. A recounting of an instance isn't necessarily a 1:1 retelling of that instance. A video of rape for example, isn't abuse anymore so than the act of rape within it, and of course the nonconsensual recording and sharing of it (because it's rape) distribution of that could necessarily be considered a crime of it's own, same with possession, however interacting with the video i'm not sure is necessarily abuse in it's own right, based on semantics. The video most certainly contains abuse, the watcher of the video may or may not like that, i'm not sure whether or that should influence that, because that's an external value. Something like "X person thought about raping Y person, and got off to it" would also be abuse under the same pretense at a certain point. There is certainly some interesting nuance here.
If i watch someone murder someone else, at what point do i become an accomplice to murder, rather than an additional victim in the chain. That's the sort of litmus test this is going to require.
That’s the gray area. AI is trained on images of abuse (we know it’s in there somewhere).
to be clear, this would be a statistically minimal amount of abuse, the vast majority of adult content is going to be legally produced and sanctioned, made public by the creators of those videos for the purposes of generating revenue. I guess the real question here, is what percent of X is still considered to be "original" enough to count as the same thing.
Like we're talking probably less than 1% of all public porn, but a significant margin, is non consensual (we will use this as the base) and the AI is trained on this set, to produce a minimally alike, or entirely distinct image from the feature set provided. So you could theoretically create a formula to determine how far removed you are from the original content in 1% of cases. I would imagine this is going to be a lot closer to 0 than it is to any significant number, unless you start including external factors, like intentionally deepfaking someone into it for example. That would be my primary concern.
That’s the gray area. AI is trained on images of abuse (we know it’s in there somewhere). So at what point can we say the modified images are okay because the abused person has been removed enough from the data?
another important concept here is human behavior as it's conceptually similar in concept to the AI in question, there are clear strict laws regarding most of these things in real life, but we aren't talking about real life. What if i had someone in my family, who got raped at some point in their life, and this has happened to several other members of my family, or friends of mine, and i decide to write a book, loosely based on the experiences of these individuals (this isn't necessarily going to be based on those instances for example, however it will most certainly be influenced by them)
There's a hugely complex hugely messy set of questions, and answers that need to be given about this. A lot of people are operating on a set of principles much too simple to be able to make any conclusive judgement about this sort of thing. Which is why this kind of discussion is ultimately important.
It can generate combinations of things that it is not trained on, so not necessarily a victim. But of course there might be something in there, I won’t deny that.
the downlow of it is quite simple, if the content is public, available for anybody to consume, and copyright permits it (i don't see why it shouldn't in most cases, although if you make porn for money, you probably hold exclusive rights to it, and you probably have a decent position to begin from, though a lengthy uphill battle nonetheless.) there's not really an argument against that. The biggest problem is identity theft and impersonation, more so than stealing work.
AI media models has to be trained on real media. The illegal content would mean illegal media and benefiting ,supporting, & profiting from and to victims of crime.
The lengths and fallacies pedophiles will go to justify themselves is absurd.
Excuse me? I am very offended by your insinuations here. It honestly makes me not want to share my thought and opinions at all. I am not in any way interested in this kind of content.
I encourage you to read my other posts in the different threads here and see. I am not an apologist, and do not condone it either.
I do genuinely believe AI can generate content it is not trained on, that's why I claimed it can generate illegal content without a victim. Because it can combine stuff from things it is trained on and end up with something original.
I am interested in learning and discussing the consequences of an emerging and novel technology on society. This is a part of that. Even if it is uncomfortable to discuss.
Don't pay any attention to that kinda stupid comment. Anyone posting that kind of misinformation about AI is either trolling or incapable of understanding how generative AI works.
You are right it is a victimless crime (for the creation of content). I could create porn with minions without using real minion porn to put the randomnest example I could think of. There's the whole defamation thing of publishing content without someone's permission but that I feel is a discussion irrelevant of AI (we could already create nasty images of someone before AI, AI just makes it easier). But using such content for personal use... It is victimless. I have a hard time thinking against it. Would availability of AI created content with unethical themes allow people to get that out of their system without creating victims? Would that make the far riskier and horrible business of creating illegal content with real unwilful people disappear? Or at the very least much more uncommon? Or would make people more willing to consume thw content creating a feelibg of fake safety towards content previously illegal? There's a lot of implications that we should really be thinking about and how it would affect society, for better or worse...
Don't pay any attention to that kinda stupid comment. Anyone posting that kind of misinformation about AI is either trolling or incapable of understanding how generative AI works
I mean, a lot of TV has murders in it. There is a huge market for showing realistic murder.
But I get the feeling your saying that there isn't a huge market for showing real people dying realistically without their permission. But that's more a technicality. The question is, is the content or the production of the content illegal. If it's not a real person, who is the victim of the crime.
Yeah the latter. Also murder in films for the most part is for storytelling. It’s not murder simulations for serial killers to get off to, you know what I mean?