It does seem like the effects (perhaps both positive and negative) increase when we go from individual artists copying the Ghibli style, to something like Thoma

It does seem like the effects (perhaps both positive and negative) increase when we go from individual artists copying the Ghibli style, to something like Thomas Kinkade Studios reproducing paintings at industrial scale, to the current endgame of Ghibli-as-a-Service, available on-demand via ML models trained on the original works. Artists don't seem happy with the pipeline of companies digesting their work, usually without permission, into ML models that are used to generate thousands of imitation works. Perhaps it is the issue of commoditizing someone's painstakingly developed individual style, or simply of competing with the artists themselves with realistic commissions that can be generated rapidly at almost zero cost.