besides whether artists should get paid or not, or whether they should be reimbursed for use of their art or not, using something without permission, or rights,

besides whether artists should get paid or not, or whether they should be reimbursed for use of their art or not, using something without permission, or rights, or license, without something that'd actually (legally) enable to do so without violating copyright, is just bad in itself. there's a great alternative to "not paying/refusing to pay" (but using and stealing stuff anyway) - just, not using other people's stuff. not using stuff that's built on copyright/license violations. not using artwork you don't own, that you don't have rights, licenses, or permissions to use. (yes, simply 'taking something and making a model from it', would be a violation.) one could just not do a shitty thing, and they wouldn't have to jump hoops to find any justification for the shitty thing they did. they could do a step-by-step art tutorial, and wouldn't have to pay anybody, nor use tools that rely on stolen artwork. but nope. highly ironic how they made this thing, and promptly showed it off to thousands of people on the internet, immediately invalidating your example they also promote (just by choosing and mentioning all of these things) those services, like Replicate, that monetize the use of stolen artwork (by selling compute, directly coupled with nn models), and ultimately profit from it (solely, without "giving back to artists whose art they perused" or anything). they could make art in a way that wouldn't participate in tech art theft racket, but they didn't. and they didn't just participate in it, but promote it and perpetuate it.