Ansel Adams Estate publicly calls out Adobe over “Ansel Adams-style” AI images

This weekend, Adobe faced criticism from the Ansel Adams Estate. The estate took to Threads to express their frustration with Adobe selling AI-generated “Ansel Adams-style” work. They posted a screenshot of these images and declared Adobe was “on their last nerve.”

Roughly a day after Ansel Adams Estate’s post, Adobe responded:

“Thank you for flagging as this goes against our Generative AI content policy. We’re glad our team was able to remove the content. We reached out via IG DM to share a way to get in touch directly in the future.”

Ironically, Adobe’s own generative AI policy states that it’s not allowed to “submit content created using prompts containing other artist names, or created using prompts otherwise intended to copy another artist.” And to make things worse, it seems that this has been going on for quite a while, according from the Estate’s reply to Adobe:

“Thanks @adobe but we’ve been in touch directly multiple times beginning in Aug 2023. Assuming you want to be taken seriously re: your purported commitment to ethical, responsible AI, while demonstrating respect for the creative community, we invite you to become proactive about complaints like ours, & to stop putting the onus on individual artists/artists’ estates to continuously police our IP on your platform, on your terms. It’s past time to stop wasting resources that don’t belong to you.”

As expected, many people commented, supporting the Estate and their public complaint about the “Ansel Adams-style” AI images. Many stood against AI, stating, “AI is not talent and it’s taking away from people who have spent decades building their craft.” Still, some folks pointed out that the transition to AI is inevitable, and we can only accept it if we want to move forward. But I’d say that’s a separate discussion.

The estate added that they don’t have a problem with people taking inspiration from Ansel Adams’s photography, but they “strenuously object to the unauthorized use of his name to sell products of any kind, including digital products, and this includes AI-generated output—regardless of whether his name has been used on the input side, or whether a given model has been trained on his work.”

I do agree with those who stand against AI in cases like this. On the one hand, I think we should embrace it and see what we can do with it. It should be no more than an aid to our vision and creation, a tool we can use to create something of our own. But using it to imitate or steal someone else’s work and then earning from it – I don’t think that’s fair. What do you think?

[via The Verge]

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