@Tanath I find it problematic that you put on the same level:
1. Creators who love, hate, and interact with input within the zeitgeist and then get inspired (consciously or unconsciously) by that.
AND
2. An A.I. software that received a massive list of URL of images inputs+descriptions, without the consent of their authors, and curated by a team (with their own political choices).
I wouldn't call 2 inspiration but just massive stealing of data for analysis.
(edited for CW)
@davidrevoy that's not my intention. I'm not equating those. People are conscious, emotional beings, while AI currently are not. There may be ethical issues w/scraping publicly posted data but that's a separate issue from what I was saying. That said, people can view the images, do analysis and use it for inspiration, so why can't AI?
The real problem as I see it is that it lowers the value of such work. That is an unfortunate downside but it's often the cost of progress from new tech.