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> who's the artist? It's fair to say it's midjourney right? By convention, we're using the term artist only for people. Midjourney is not a person, it's a tool
by Udo 4y ago
> who's the artist? It's fair to say it's midjourney right?
By convention, we're using the term artist only for people. Midjourney is not a person, it's a tool. Just like a Gravatar image is not made by the artist Gravatar, it's made by a generator, using rules and some input. Midjourney's rules come from all the stuff it saw when it was trained, and its input comes from humans entering text prompts. You could argue the same applies to human artists, but that doesn't make them equivalent just because they have some things in common.
So, Midjourney is not an artist. But is a person entering a prompt an artist or not? I would argue that there are people skilled and creative at engineering prompts, or further refining the generated outputs. It's not NOT art. Then again, that has always been a matter of interpretation.
> But a machine can only copy. Or you're saying a machine can be an artist.
That's a very Hollywood interpretation. Obviously a machine can be an artist, because humans are also machines (unless you're arguing for the supernatural).
As I said above, the common convention is that an artist should be a person. We have long ago decided that a person can use tools, including generative algorithms, to make what is considered art. However, nobody is obligated to appreciate any given artwork, so I don't see what's being lost if we just let this development play out.
> So - with as few words as possible, who is the artist of that picture?
(HN won't let me reply to your question below directly, so I'll add it here). In your opinion, does every picture HAVE to be made by an artist? If your answer is "yes", then the artist is the human entering the prompt, although the artistic work may have been quite minimal. If your answer is "no", or "it depends on the result", there may be no artist.
Let's say a camera takes a picture of a public place every few minutes and puts it online. Who's the artist?
- quadcore 4y agoSay you generate a picture with midjourney, someone has to be the artist of that picture right? So - with as few words as possible, who is the artist of that picture?
- dragonwriter 4y ago> Say you generate a picture with midjourney, someone has to be the artist of that picture right? No, they don't. Nor, if there is at least one artist, does it need to be exactly one. An image can be created without artistry/authorship or with multiple people’s artistry combined, either by collaboration or otherwise.
- quadcore 4y agoNo, they don't. So you're saying this picture cant be copyrighted? does it need to be exactly one Indeed, the artists are the ones who made the picture used in the training set.
- myrryr 4y agoThat is a good outcome I think. You can still use it anywhere, you just can't "claim it"
- quadcore 4y agoDoesnt work if we can fairly find the artists of that picture - like the artists who made the pictures used in the training set.
- myrryr 4y agoWell, again, who are you going to attribute it too? given a training image is good for about 1 byte of information, an image would have..... well over a million likely contributors. Same as any art an artist comes up with, given all the things they have seen in their life leading up to the image. Placing it in public domain seems like a easy way to stop it being hard core commercialized. And honestly, given the crazy extensions on copyright laws, it seems pretty fair to do so.
- dragonwriter 4y ago> So you’re saying this picture cant be copyrighted? No, if I was saying that, I’d say “It’s not a sufficiently creative work and cannot be said to have an artist”. What I’m saying is that “you created an image with midjourney” (and the same goes for SD, whether base models or something more custom) does not appear to me (though, to be fair, I'm familiar with the broad concept of the test but not the details of any closely on-point case law – or even loosely analogous specific cases – when it comes to this threshold issue) to be a clearly sufficient basis for asserting either that it must or must not have an artist. > Indeed, the artists are the ones who made the picture used in the training set. If there is exactly one picture in the training set and all the model can do is reproduce it then, yes, the artist of that picture is trivially the artist of any of the (identical) pictures generated. But that’s not how actual midjourney works. IF there are many pictures in the training set, and all the model can do is reproduce one of them, but different prompts reproduce different images, then, again, the artist of that image is the artist of the identical result, but, again, Midjourney isn’t Google Images with an “I’m feeling lucky” button, so that’s not the right analysis, either.
- saberience 4y ago“ That's a very Hollywood interpretation. Obviously a machine can be an artist, because humans are also machines (unless you're arguing for the supernatural).” You assert that humans and “machines” are equivalent as though it’s some known fact that all rational beings would agree with but I think this is rather far from the truth. I think most people would take issue with your assertion that humans and machines are one and the same. Human beings show actions, behaviors, emotions which don’t appear to be replicated in any “machine” and we don’t even really know how to begin to make machines that feel emotion. Art begins with emotion and feeling, the machines we have built show no emotion and as such they are not making art. What we have right now is advanced mimicry, that is all.