Thank you for writing this! My day job is social work, so there's a lot of "your perception of things is your reality" going on. Your bit about believing a lie doesn't make it truth (to paraphrase) really resounds with me.
I haven't published a thing yet, but I'm writing my heart out. A bunch of other writers recently found out their work has been stolen by AI programmers, which is demoralizing even for the unpublished. By stolen, I mean the writers weren't asked, notified, or paid. We can write a disclaimer on each work saying we do not give permission to use our work for AI, but there's no recourse until someone files a lawsuit, which most writers can't afford. I heard even Stephen King has books that have been stolen and he could afford to sue, but he hasn't.
Beautifully articulated Vrk! I love walking and hiking and to me, it would be the equivalent of being driven up a mountain instead of walking. Yes, you may see the view at the top, but you won’t appreciate it in the same way when you need to put in the work to get there.
And drawing with a pencil is meditative, mindful, meaningful, you are living in the present moment. Your brain is being used to the max, you are in flow. There is no comparison to typing in a few words to create an image. It might produce a quick dopamine hit, but the pencil will produce oxytocin, the equivalent of a long and loving embrace instead of a quick pat on the back. Thank you for this thought-provoking essay!
This was a good read! You're preaching to the choir with me but I particularly liked your analogy of walkable cities and how cars being prioritized is actually unfortunate in the future being similar to how AI is being prioritized in tech. I also REALLY liked your example of the Truman show and how just because it was believable didn't make his world any less fake or desirable. I this the fast fashion example of how ultimately the industry is to blame more than individual consumers is a good reality check to maybe help us artists have a bit more compassion towards individual people who have been convinced they need AI. I think this is especially important to hear from a software engineer who is in and around the tech industry. Thank you for writing this.
You've really helped me start crystalizing some thoughts around why I've felt so disconnected and stuck lately. Perhaps not directly related to this piece, but I think I've discovered that I've been mistaking competence for creativity. Thanks for helping me think this through.
By the way, as I read this I kept thinking of Charlie Chaplin's character, stuck in the gears in Modern Times. Perhaps it is time to watch that movie again.
Yes to all, but I want to specifically +1 CLASSES. I love that you’ve filled your sabbatical with classes and group settings and learning new things. I went on a sabbatical of sorts when I was laid off last summer, and claaaaaaasses have made life so good. I hope you’re able to keep that spirit of exploration and learning going in some capacity when you’re back to work. ✌️
As a software engineer, it is hard to find other people in the field that at the minimum questions the use of AI. I see it as a tool that can be used to build cool things, but it's still being sold as the savior and end-all be-all, and it is very frustrating. At the beginning of the gen ai explosion, I thought it was interesting that it could reproduce an artists style, but after understanding how they are trained also starting to draw and see how hard it is to communicate something in a few lines, and understand how much work artist put into their creations, I cannot support that part of the ai craze. I really loved your essay.
Thanks so much, Sara!! I know exactly what you mean when you say "the savior and end-all be-all" 😩 Sigh!! But it's so great to meet like-minded software engineers. I hope we can continue to question and bring more nuance to the AI conversation. I'm so glad you enjoyed the essay and thanks so much for reading!! 💖
"On internet platforms, it's easy for the simplest discussion between strangers to devolve into nastiness; and yet the art community has figured out how to get a room of 20+ strangers to draw someone's naked body for 3+ hours, and not only does everyone feel safe, but you leave feeling enriched." Yes! Loved this essay and the connection you have built with yourself and the community. We need more of this in the technology sphere and not have efficiency as the only metric for value! Spot on! Well done.
Thank you, Shiela!!! I totally agree with you, and I think it's so wonderful that we are both working toward such similar missions 🥹 I appreciate you so much!!
love this essay! i think deep learning is super powerful and can be used for good, however there’s a lot wrong with how it’s being used in creative spaces. good take !
I hit the like button so hard on this I broke my phone!!! (Jokes, jokes)
For real though, this is a great reflection. I’m consistently convinced that somehow too many folks have lost the ability toward enjoying practice, and play... And then, couple that with a kind of apathy and even honestly an outright contempt for people who use their products and, well, it’s bad out there. “Making other people live in a simulation so long as you remained on the production team” goes so hard!!! It’s so true. “Here’s an example of a satirically bad place I was inspired by; I have taken steps to create it and ensure I’m governing it so I don’t have to endure it like the rest of you.”
Super excited for what’s in store for you vrk and thank you again for another excellent essay. ❤️❤️
> somehow too many folks have lost the ability toward enjoying practice, and play...
Absolutely. And tech is leading the pack, trailblazing new ways to lose touch with these things faster than ever 🫠
> honestly an outright contempt for people who use their products
🎯🎯🎯
> Here’s an example of a satirically bad place I was inspired by; I have taken steps to create it and ensure I’m governing it so I don’t have to endure it like the rest of you
🎯🎯🎯🎯🎯🎯
It is WILD!! The way that there are tech people referencing *literal dystopian fiction* as inspiration ?????
Well I am ENERGIZED and MOTIVATED to try to pave a new path forward!!!
Thanks as always JM, I appreciate your support and encouragement so much!!! 🥹🫶
Thank you for sharing this. I am not an artist, but I feel much the same way about AI writing. I refuse to use LLMs to write for me, even though many people I know rave about how "efficient" it makes their "content production". Writing is not about content production for me - it's about discovering what I think. The "aliveness" comes from me struggling to decide how to communicate an idea, choosing which words best represent my intent. While I can't always tell when writing is produced by AI, more and more of the "content" I see feels soulless.
Efficiency is not the goal I choose for my life. I want to feel alive. I want to express my own experience. And AI is a shallow simulacrum of that, much like social media is a shallow simulacrum of actual human connection, and fast food is a shallow simulacrum of nutritious, filling food. It's more efficient and convenient, perhaps, but it does not have the depth of experience, and I choose depth over efficiency.
Thanks so much, Eric!! I completely agree, I feel the exact same way about writing as well.
It's kinda wild how a lot of the marketing around this stuff is like, "No don't worry, ChatGPT is just your assistant who's here to help you!" -- But if you imagine having a real-life person who was with you all the time, with unacknowledged political affiliations/biases/motivations and no understanding of boundaries, telling you what's good and bad with false authority; to the point that it is literally writing your words for you...... that seems like a *dangerous* influence on your life, not some aspiration!
I'm so with you on depth over efficiency!! I really appreciate you reading and commenting, and I'm so glad this resonated 💓
Lovely essay! The part about how art consists of making decisions really resonated with me, I wrote something similar a while back https://substack.com/home/post/p-147651359 about how the craft in illustrating is making those infinite decisions and how you go about deciding what to do and the message you're trying to tell!
Ohhh I loved this!! Thank you for sharing your post 🥹
"A picture is a thousand words, an illustration is infinite decisions. What is the focal point? How can I display it in a way that’s not too obvious? How do I make sure the rest of the image leads to that point? Did I mean that stray line? How do I ease these two colors into each other? When do I stop?" YES!!!
Sooo many of my tech friends (in a very well-meaning way) have essentially asked me, "why are you so obsessed with pen and paper? aren't you bored of it?" and I'm like UM IT KEEPS DEFEATING ME THOUGH??? Every time I try to understand it, not only do I fail but somehow it teaches me something new about the universe??? (I meant this only in the most positive of ways!! 😂)
Another irony is that... I SWEAR software engineers would love illustration if they'd only respect it 💀 like the amount of sheer *problem-solving* involved in creating a illustration is awe-inspiring!!
Thanks so much for reading and I'm so glad you enjoyed 🫶
So real!!! I feel like honestly it’s similar to software engineering in a way too - there’s so many decisions into making software that is usable / beautiful / performance / scales well etc that gen AI glosses over when making an app- I think people don’t understand the nuances of the craft until they get into it 😭 illustration is so so hard I usually only make one once a year now :,) loved discussing this!! 💖
Like Carolyn, I so appreciate you capturing how I feel about GenAI and art. As someone who often laments how awful a lot of product UX is these days, this line was particularly relevant and relatable: "Wow, what would technology feel like if we built it with 1000x more thought, intention, and heart?" I appreciate smaller makers who keep this in mind when creating their goods, but I feel that ship has sailed for Big Tech. It's very sad to think how far some companies have deviated from their original, fairly altruistic missions and have succumbed to absolute greed at the expense of all.
I admire your journey in art. It's inspiring! I'm curious what software you'll create in the near future.
Thank you so much, Cheryl!! Really appreciate you reading 🙏
> It's very sad to think how far some companies have deviated from their original, fairly altruistic missions and have succumbed to absolute greed at the expense of all.
Completely. Ugh software is unfortunately such a perfect storm for this -- the business of software being so absurdly good (extremely high margins, near-limitless ability to scale, etc) combined with so many Computer Scientists being poor at the humanities / outright disrespecting the humanities -- it's really sad to see how much of tech has taken such a dark turn...
But I do have a lot of optimism in the power of small makers / small business!! I think it's an extremely underdeveloped side in tech (I don't count VC-backed startups as "small businesses" as they're expected to grow up to billion dollar titans) and I've seen the wonders that small businesses of other industries can do for communities. I hope to see more, and I hope to contribute to the mix myself 💖
I think the comparison to automotive technology is even more apt than you describe. It's not just that cars have dominated infrastructure in the US for generations (arguably since about the end of WWII), but that collectively we have largely forgotten, as citizens and city planners, how to incorporate other means of transportation—or how to structure a community such that no transportation beyond one's feet, crutches, or wheelchair are necessary.
Railroads crumble a little more every year. Buses get stuck in traffic and are maligned quite unfairly. Cyclists are derided and threatened for disrupting the automotive status quo. But cars are more plentiful and traffic only gets worse.
A future dominated by generative AI brings with it the threat of losing trades and arts and knowledge workers. While there may be hardcore hobbyists who keep their disciplines alive, just as the underground musicians of 20th century China did, other disciplines may die out entirely. If AI replaces enough workers for long enough before its bubble bursts, we will have a difficult pedagogical climb ahead of us. The world recovered from losing the library at Alexandria, but what would life have been like had it never burned?
Thought-provoking essay. Thank you for writing it!
> collectively we have largely forgotten, as citizens and city planners, how to incorporate other means of transportation—or how to structure a community such that no transportation beyond one's feet, crutches, or wheelchair are necessary.
> A future dominated by generative AI brings with it the threat of losing trades and arts and knowledge workers.
Ugh I feel this so much!!! Yes yes yes. I have heard tech folks say, effectively, "I wish people would just calm down about generative AI, it's just another new technology" and I could not disagree more. I think there is a LOT at a stake, and uniquely in this moment.
Really appreciate you reading and adding your insights. Thank you!! 💓
Thank you for verbalizing everything I feel 💛 This line especially hit "Maybe you'd be happy making other people live in a simulation so long as you remained on the production team" and the arms race to 'win' at AI parallels a lot of what I find icky and depraved about crypto. Both technologies have helpful, life-changing uses, but the ways corporate greed are using them are NOT IT.
Ugh absolutely!! It is sooo frustrating to know that something that could be a wonderful technology for *everyone* is instead being used for haphazard destruction in pursuit of money and power 🫠 sighghghghghghghgh!!!!
But I'm so happy to hear that my words could do justice for describing your feelings on this 🥹💖 Thank you so much for reading and sharing!!
This was SO COOL (and infuriating 😭) to read!!! "Computer scientists often thought they were aligned with artists’ ways of seeing, while in practice, they trained their systems to see like a client" was a huge 💡 for me (makes so much sense) and I absolutely loved that last line " As machines learn to see images in a certain way, artists (and everyone really) must, in turn, learn to identify, question, and oppose these ways of seeing."
Thank you for writing this! My day job is social work, so there's a lot of "your perception of things is your reality" going on. Your bit about believing a lie doesn't make it truth (to paraphrase) really resounds with me.
I haven't published a thing yet, but I'm writing my heart out. A bunch of other writers recently found out their work has been stolen by AI programmers, which is demoralizing even for the unpublished. By stolen, I mean the writers weren't asked, notified, or paid. We can write a disclaimer on each work saying we do not give permission to use our work for AI, but there's no recourse until someone files a lawsuit, which most writers can't afford. I heard even Stephen King has books that have been stolen and he could afford to sue, but he hasn't.
Beautifully articulated Vrk! I love walking and hiking and to me, it would be the equivalent of being driven up a mountain instead of walking. Yes, you may see the view at the top, but you won’t appreciate it in the same way when you need to put in the work to get there.
And drawing with a pencil is meditative, mindful, meaningful, you are living in the present moment. Your brain is being used to the max, you are in flow. There is no comparison to typing in a few words to create an image. It might produce a quick dopamine hit, but the pencil will produce oxytocin, the equivalent of a long and loving embrace instead of a quick pat on the back. Thank you for this thought-provoking essay!
This was a good read! You're preaching to the choir with me but I particularly liked your analogy of walkable cities and how cars being prioritized is actually unfortunate in the future being similar to how AI is being prioritized in tech. I also REALLY liked your example of the Truman show and how just because it was believable didn't make his world any less fake or desirable. I this the fast fashion example of how ultimately the industry is to blame more than individual consumers is a good reality check to maybe help us artists have a bit more compassion towards individual people who have been convinced they need AI. I think this is especially important to hear from a software engineer who is in and around the tech industry. Thank you for writing this.
Yes. All of this — YES. Keep the SOUL in art! The choices! The mistakes! The PROCESS! <3
Thank you for this articulate and thoughtful critique—sharing this with my friends, many of whom are both artists and software engineers.
You've really helped me start crystalizing some thoughts around why I've felt so disconnected and stuck lately. Perhaps not directly related to this piece, but I think I've discovered that I've been mistaking competence for creativity. Thanks for helping me think this through.
By the way, as I read this I kept thinking of Charlie Chaplin's character, stuck in the gears in Modern Times. Perhaps it is time to watch that movie again.
Yes to all, but I want to specifically +1 CLASSES. I love that you’ve filled your sabbatical with classes and group settings and learning new things. I went on a sabbatical of sorts when I was laid off last summer, and claaaaaaasses have made life so good. I hope you’re able to keep that spirit of exploration and learning going in some capacity when you’re back to work. ✌️
As a software engineer, it is hard to find other people in the field that at the minimum questions the use of AI. I see it as a tool that can be used to build cool things, but it's still being sold as the savior and end-all be-all, and it is very frustrating. At the beginning of the gen ai explosion, I thought it was interesting that it could reproduce an artists style, but after understanding how they are trained also starting to draw and see how hard it is to communicate something in a few lines, and understand how much work artist put into their creations, I cannot support that part of the ai craze. I really loved your essay.
Thanks so much, Sara!! I know exactly what you mean when you say "the savior and end-all be-all" 😩 Sigh!! But it's so great to meet like-minded software engineers. I hope we can continue to question and bring more nuance to the AI conversation. I'm so glad you enjoyed the essay and thanks so much for reading!! 💖
"On internet platforms, it's easy for the simplest discussion between strangers to devolve into nastiness; and yet the art community has figured out how to get a room of 20+ strangers to draw someone's naked body for 3+ hours, and not only does everyone feel safe, but you leave feeling enriched." Yes! Loved this essay and the connection you have built with yourself and the community. We need more of this in the technology sphere and not have efficiency as the only metric for value! Spot on! Well done.
Thank you, Shiela!!! I totally agree with you, and I think it's so wonderful that we are both working toward such similar missions 🥹 I appreciate you so much!!
love this essay! i think deep learning is super powerful and can be used for good, however there’s a lot wrong with how it’s being used in creative spaces. good take !
Thanks so much Brooklyn, so glad you enjoyed it!! And totally, lots of interesting applications when used with care. Appreciate you reading!! 🙏
I hit the like button so hard on this I broke my phone!!! (Jokes, jokes)
For real though, this is a great reflection. I’m consistently convinced that somehow too many folks have lost the ability toward enjoying practice, and play... And then, couple that with a kind of apathy and even honestly an outright contempt for people who use their products and, well, it’s bad out there. “Making other people live in a simulation so long as you remained on the production team” goes so hard!!! It’s so true. “Here’s an example of a satirically bad place I was inspired by; I have taken steps to create it and ensure I’m governing it so I don’t have to endure it like the rest of you.”
Super excited for what’s in store for you vrk and thank you again for another excellent essay. ❤️❤️
> somehow too many folks have lost the ability toward enjoying practice, and play...
Absolutely. And tech is leading the pack, trailblazing new ways to lose touch with these things faster than ever 🫠
> honestly an outright contempt for people who use their products
🎯🎯🎯
> Here’s an example of a satirically bad place I was inspired by; I have taken steps to create it and ensure I’m governing it so I don’t have to endure it like the rest of you
🎯🎯🎯🎯🎯🎯
It is WILD!! The way that there are tech people referencing *literal dystopian fiction* as inspiration ?????
Well I am ENERGIZED and MOTIVATED to try to pave a new path forward!!!
Thanks as always JM, I appreciate your support and encouragement so much!!! 🥹🫶
Thank you for sharing this. I am not an artist, but I feel much the same way about AI writing. I refuse to use LLMs to write for me, even though many people I know rave about how "efficient" it makes their "content production". Writing is not about content production for me - it's about discovering what I think. The "aliveness" comes from me struggling to decide how to communicate an idea, choosing which words best represent my intent. While I can't always tell when writing is produced by AI, more and more of the "content" I see feels soulless.
Efficiency is not the goal I choose for my life. I want to feel alive. I want to express my own experience. And AI is a shallow simulacrum of that, much like social media is a shallow simulacrum of actual human connection, and fast food is a shallow simulacrum of nutritious, filling food. It's more efficient and convenient, perhaps, but it does not have the depth of experience, and I choose depth over efficiency.
Thanks so much, Eric!! I completely agree, I feel the exact same way about writing as well.
It's kinda wild how a lot of the marketing around this stuff is like, "No don't worry, ChatGPT is just your assistant who's here to help you!" -- But if you imagine having a real-life person who was with you all the time, with unacknowledged political affiliations/biases/motivations and no understanding of boundaries, telling you what's good and bad with false authority; to the point that it is literally writing your words for you...... that seems like a *dangerous* influence on your life, not some aspiration!
I'm so with you on depth over efficiency!! I really appreciate you reading and commenting, and I'm so glad this resonated 💓
Lovely essay! The part about how art consists of making decisions really resonated with me, I wrote something similar a while back https://substack.com/home/post/p-147651359 about how the craft in illustrating is making those infinite decisions and how you go about deciding what to do and the message you're trying to tell!
Ohhh I loved this!! Thank you for sharing your post 🥹
"A picture is a thousand words, an illustration is infinite decisions. What is the focal point? How can I display it in a way that’s not too obvious? How do I make sure the rest of the image leads to that point? Did I mean that stray line? How do I ease these two colors into each other? When do I stop?" YES!!!
Sooo many of my tech friends (in a very well-meaning way) have essentially asked me, "why are you so obsessed with pen and paper? aren't you bored of it?" and I'm like UM IT KEEPS DEFEATING ME THOUGH??? Every time I try to understand it, not only do I fail but somehow it teaches me something new about the universe??? (I meant this only in the most positive of ways!! 😂)
Another irony is that... I SWEAR software engineers would love illustration if they'd only respect it 💀 like the amount of sheer *problem-solving* involved in creating a illustration is awe-inspiring!!
Thanks so much for reading and I'm so glad you enjoyed 🫶
So real!!! I feel like honestly it’s similar to software engineering in a way too - there’s so many decisions into making software that is usable / beautiful / performance / scales well etc that gen AI glosses over when making an app- I think people don’t understand the nuances of the craft until they get into it 😭 illustration is so so hard I usually only make one once a year now :,) loved discussing this!! 💖
Like Carolyn, I so appreciate you capturing how I feel about GenAI and art. As someone who often laments how awful a lot of product UX is these days, this line was particularly relevant and relatable: "Wow, what would technology feel like if we built it with 1000x more thought, intention, and heart?" I appreciate smaller makers who keep this in mind when creating their goods, but I feel that ship has sailed for Big Tech. It's very sad to think how far some companies have deviated from their original, fairly altruistic missions and have succumbed to absolute greed at the expense of all.
I admire your journey in art. It's inspiring! I'm curious what software you'll create in the near future.
Thank you so much, Cheryl!! Really appreciate you reading 🙏
> It's very sad to think how far some companies have deviated from their original, fairly altruistic missions and have succumbed to absolute greed at the expense of all.
Completely. Ugh software is unfortunately such a perfect storm for this -- the business of software being so absurdly good (extremely high margins, near-limitless ability to scale, etc) combined with so many Computer Scientists being poor at the humanities / outright disrespecting the humanities -- it's really sad to see how much of tech has taken such a dark turn...
But I do have a lot of optimism in the power of small makers / small business!! I think it's an extremely underdeveloped side in tech (I don't count VC-backed startups as "small businesses" as they're expected to grow up to billion dollar titans) and I've seen the wonders that small businesses of other industries can do for communities. I hope to see more, and I hope to contribute to the mix myself 💖
I think the comparison to automotive technology is even more apt than you describe. It's not just that cars have dominated infrastructure in the US for generations (arguably since about the end of WWII), but that collectively we have largely forgotten, as citizens and city planners, how to incorporate other means of transportation—or how to structure a community such that no transportation beyond one's feet, crutches, or wheelchair are necessary.
Railroads crumble a little more every year. Buses get stuck in traffic and are maligned quite unfairly. Cyclists are derided and threatened for disrupting the automotive status quo. But cars are more plentiful and traffic only gets worse.
A future dominated by generative AI brings with it the threat of losing trades and arts and knowledge workers. While there may be hardcore hobbyists who keep their disciplines alive, just as the underground musicians of 20th century China did, other disciplines may die out entirely. If AI replaces enough workers for long enough before its bubble bursts, we will have a difficult pedagogical climb ahead of us. The world recovered from losing the library at Alexandria, but what would life have been like had it never burned?
Thought-provoking essay. Thank you for writing it!
Thanks so much, James!!
> collectively we have largely forgotten, as citizens and city planners, how to incorporate other means of transportation—or how to structure a community such that no transportation beyond one's feet, crutches, or wheelchair are necessary.
> A future dominated by generative AI brings with it the threat of losing trades and arts and knowledge workers.
Ugh I feel this so much!!! Yes yes yes. I have heard tech folks say, effectively, "I wish people would just calm down about generative AI, it's just another new technology" and I could not disagree more. I think there is a LOT at a stake, and uniquely in this moment.
Really appreciate you reading and adding your insights. Thank you!! 💓
Thank you for verbalizing everything I feel 💛 This line especially hit "Maybe you'd be happy making other people live in a simulation so long as you remained on the production team" and the arms race to 'win' at AI parallels a lot of what I find icky and depraved about crypto. Both technologies have helpful, life-changing uses, but the ways corporate greed are using them are NOT IT.
Ugh absolutely!! It is sooo frustrating to know that something that could be a wonderful technology for *everyone* is instead being used for haphazard destruction in pursuit of money and power 🫠 sighghghghghghghgh!!!!
But I'm so happy to hear that my words could do justice for describing your feelings on this 🥹💖 Thank you so much for reading and sharing!!
You might also enjoy this post of an illustrator and PhD student training AI on illustrators' work and their analysis of it! https://julienposture.substack.com/p/the-ai-doppelganger-experiment-part-040
This was SO COOL (and infuriating 😭) to read!!! "Computer scientists often thought they were aligned with artists’ ways of seeing, while in practice, they trained their systems to see like a client" was a huge 💡 for me (makes so much sense) and I absolutely loved that last line " As machines learn to see images in a certain way, artists (and everyone really) must, in turn, learn to identify, question, and oppose these ways of seeing."
Thanks so much for sharing!!