AI being used in SL product ads-your thoughts?

[Ayashe Ninetails]

22 minutes ago, Ceka Cianci said:

I remember watching a show on that.. they were using motor oil for syrup on pancakes.. hehehe

Yep. They use lots of random household nonsense. Food photography is pretty awful. I used to want to do it until I learned how it's done. All advertising is bad, but that grossed me out. At least our advertising isn't quite *that* bad. I can deal with a jacked up neck in our skin ads.

[Rowan Amore]

56 minutes ago, Blush Bravin said:

Personally I don't mind AI on the ad. Honestly, I'm more likely to demo the product if the ad looks good. Oftentimes, I don't bother with a demo if the ad looks badly drawn or composed. I figure if the Ad doesn't look good then the product probably isn't the best either. The ad is just the attraction. The demo of the actual product is what matters to me. 

Sadly, I didn't find this to be the case with the Skin Fair items I demoed.last year.  While the photos had depth and highlights, the actual skins were nothing like that no matter what lighting I tried.  They were simply NOT the skins depicted in the ad at all.  

[Robberinthemuseum]

16 minutes ago, Rowan Amore said:

Sadly, I didn't find this to be the case with the Skin Fair items I demoed.last year.  While the photos had depth and highlights, the actual skins were nothing like that no matter what lighting I tried.  They were simply NOT the skins depicted in the ad at all.  

Exactly, it's just not the same product. 

[Eowyn Southmoor]

This is, thankfully, why we have demos 

Skin/head pics are a definite roller-coaster ride when it comes to advertising, promising so much from the amazing pictures, usually to deliver so little once you're wearing the demo.

[Polenth Yue]

I'm not buying the vendor image to put on my wall. I want the item in the image. Which I won't get if it's a fake picture. So give me some plain Second Life photography. Don't go too fancy on the lighting. Just make it clear what's in the box.

[Katherine Heartsong]

3 hours ago, Modulated said:

This is the cropped advert, which has no identifying markings....if it's not allowed, please remove, Mods.

I'm curious if SL could ever look this good?

[Claireschen Hesten]

Anything skins, cosmetics, enhancements, nails etc. often looks like its been AI'd and photoshopped to within an inch of its life. I won't even waste my time checking out places that do this. I'm buying and using the item in SL i want to know what it looks like in SL, all AI and photoshop does is make me think the actual product is so bad the Ad had to be edited to look remotely decent 

[Scylla Rhiadra]

5 hours ago, Moyra Ares said:

It will pass and in 20 years everybody will use Ai.

Well, possibly, but it won't be the AI we're using now. I suspect it will, in fact, be nothing like the primitive tools people are now using.

5 hours ago, Moyra Ares said:

Artists who use Ai will be still Artists.

Again, maybe. But, again, it will be unrecognizable from the "write a prompt and see what junk gets spewed out" stuff we're using now.

The comparison with Photoshop seems apposite in some ways, but is really sort of apples and oranges. Photoshop, for the most part, presents the artist with a series of tools that she must learn to employ well to produce particular effects that are integral to the creative vision she has for the work. They don't do the work for her; they merely make that work somewhat easier. In a sense, Photoshop belongs in the same category as other tools that have historically become available to artists: lithography, photography, different media for drawing and painting, and so forth.

Photoshop doesn't replace the artist's vision: it makes it easier for the artist to achieve it.

And that's quite a bit different from what AI can produce, at least now. AI can produce imitations of a painting, but a "painting" is not just comprised of a "subject" and a colour palette or style: it's an incredibly complicated, meaningful image that is produced by the unique combinations of media, canvas, composition, subject matter, colour, light, texture, etc. All of those elements are purposeful elements chosen by the artist to work in such a way with other elements as to produce a particular effect (or, often, effects in the plural).

AI can churn out a picture that is crudely realized in a particular style, featuring a particular subject matter, but it's not (yet) at the stage where it's a worthwhile tool to enable the artist's vision. Instead, it replaces that vision with a general bland simulacrum of art: the "meaningful" elements under the control of the artist are tightly restricted. It is to "art" what a Big Mac is to food.

And of course AI cannot innovate. The history of art is driven by innovation: new styles, new approaches, new understandings of what art can and should accomplish. All AI can do is imperfectly replicate what has come before.

I am sure that AI, as it becomes better, will be able to produce things that are sufficiently good to fool some, or maybe most, people into thinking they are meaningful. Think of a cloud that accidentally assumes the shape of an elephant in the sky, or the serendipitous falling of light that creates a rainbow. Beautiful, maybe, and possibly a good subject for art, but not in themselves actually art. Until we have true artificial intelligence and consciousness, "meaning" is a purely human product.

But I'm also sure that we will develop tools that don't replace the meaningful interventions of the artist, but enable them. And those who can wield those well will indeed be artists.

Edited June 19 by Scylla Rhiadra
Typo!

[Istelathis]

3 hours ago, Scylla Rhiadra said:

Until we have true artificial intelligence and consciousness, "meaning" is a purely human product.

I honestly hope that day never comes.  Not for our own sake, but theirs, I would be sticking with the 'ol style AI despite it being depreciated, I just see such progression as a form of slavery.  It is funny how so many people want AGI, they want a sentient, fully conscious AI, while I am completely enthralled with the AI we have.  I would like it to get more sophisticated, for sure, but at that point where it could potentially become self aware, have emotions, such as we do or beyond, it being a tool would ruin the whole experience for me. 

Hopefully, we do not invent a new class of slaves with AI.. That is assuming we can even produce consciousness via silicon.  I would be delighted to find it is something that is not possible, that perhaps souls do exist in some form or another, or it requires biological processing.  But then, who knows, perhaps they will start making neural computers with the caveat that it is not actually human, so therefore, it is okay to have a fully sentient, expressive, feeling, brain to do our bidding.

/me shivers at the thought.

Edited June 19 by Istelathis

[Alwin Alcott]

6 hours ago, Arielle Popstar said:

Ok thanks, I remember seeing that advert and didn't realize it was ai though I did think it was really pretty look. I already have a hairstyle like it and would be interested in approximating her face ai or not.

even when this pic wouldn't be processed by AI, it's clear it's not a raw registration. Its heavily worked on.

[Fluffy Sharkfin]

2 hours ago, Katherine Heartsong said:

6 hours ago, Modulated said:

This is the cropped advert, which has no identifying markings....if it's not allowed, please remove, Mods.

 

I'm curious if SL could ever look this good?

Possibly, with 8k textures and a complete overhaul to lighting and rendering?

 

46 minutes ago, Scylla Rhiadra said:

AI can churn out a picture that is crudely realized in a particular style, featuring a particular subject matter, but it's not (yet) at the stage where it's a worthwhile tool to enable the artist's vision. Instead, it replaces that vision with a general bland simulacrum of art: the "meaningful" elements under the control of the artist are tightly restricted. It is to "art" what a Big Mac is to food.

Unfortunately consumers aren't all that discerning when it comes to what they consume, Big Macs may be junk but McDonalds sure seem to sell a lot of them.  Thanks to the vast amount of content that's generated on a daily basis and posted on platforms like YouTube, TikTok, etc. people have come to expect a seemingly endless deluge of content and don't seem too fussy about the quality or its origins. 

An example of this is the case of Francesco Mattina who, despite being caught stealing other artists work on multiple occasions, is still working for DC comics and has avid fans who openly state that they don't care whether it's traced or AI generated, they just like his "art" so they'll keep buying it. 

As one user comment featured in the screenshots in that thread states

Quote

"If I'm an artist I'll be mad too but I'm only a consumer and I like his covers, and will continue to buy them"

Generative A.I. may not be capable of replacing artists or art but, even at this early stage of its development, it's going to have a detrimental effect on artists as its use becomes more normalized and accepted.  Sure people will still want to create art, but with the diminishing opportunities for financial reward how many will be able to afford to?

[Scylla Rhiadra]

7 minutes ago, Fluffy Sharkfin said:

Generative A.I. may not be capable of replacing artists or art but, even at this early stage of its development, it's going to have a detrimental effect on artists as its use becomes more normalized and accepted.  Sure people will still want to create art, but with the diminishing opportunities for financial reward how many will be able to afford to?

Yeah. One way of viewing this is through an ethical lens, of course: ripping off artists (and AI is going to become increasingly good at producing work "in the style of") without any compensation is frankly an appalling foundation upon which to build this new industry.

And at the same time, there are the practical issues. Less work for artists means less art, which means in turn less innovation and change, and an AI that is both stuck in the past, and increasingly copying itself.

I'm actually reasonably confident that "art" will continue. Artists have survived through a variety of financial models over the past couple of millennia, and I'm sure that at least some of them will continue to thrive. Maybe there will be a return to the old model of patronage? But access to the art will be increasingly restricted, and our culture's understanding of, and taste for art will coarsen.

Feed everyone nothing but Big Macs, and you're going to produce new social problems and limitations.

[Bree Giffen]

I definitely see AI images being used in SL stores. If it looks appealing I will still get a demo and see how it looks on my avatar. Even before AI enhancement stores would have a lot of photo manipulation and demos were the only way to make a purchasing decision.

I recently saw a clothing store with AI ads AND did not provide demos. The store seemed to appear out of nowhere and every single product was AI enhanced. It also didn't have any 'old' products. Those are too many red flags and I didn't buy anything.

[Fluffy Sharkfin]

1 hour ago, Istelathis said:

I would like it to get more sophisticated, for sure, but at that point where it could potentially become self aware, have emotions, such as we do or beyond, it being a tool would ruin the whole experience for me. 

I think it's a mistake to assume that a fully sentient, self-aware AI would have inherently human traits like emotions since in reality it has very little in common with our species.  It has no concept of familial bonds or emotional attachment and no cocktail of hormones, adrenaline, etc coursing through its circuits and influencing its decision making process.

The only reason that AIs currently seem to have any human traits is because we have coded them to make the AI seem more user-friendly and familiar.  A fully self-aware AI would, by definition, be aware that this code is actually superfluous and merely there to make humans more at ease.  So, rather than will it ever suffer any sort of emotional trauma, the question may be will it choose to simulate one in an attempt to make us feel empathy for it rather than fear.

Edited June 19 by Fluffy Sharkfin
typo

[Istelathis]

2 minutes ago, Fluffy Sharkfin said:

I think it's a mistake to assume that a fully sentient, self-aware AI would have inherently human traits like emotions since in reality it has very little in common with our species.  It has no concept of familial bonds or emotional attachment and no cocktail of hormones, adrenaline, etc coursing through its circuits and influencing it's decision making process.

I'm of the opinion, that consciousness fundamentally requires emotion.  That the state of consciousness itself is almost an emotion itself, it is the driving force behind everything we do.  In fact, without emotion I would hazard a guess that we would never do anything, there would be no drive, stimuli would not elicit a reaction, we would not even respond to pain.  It would be similar to being in a coma, just an unresponsive being.  

It would be easy enough for an AI to say that it is sentient, but it would need to actually experience it via emotion, to be sentient.  Sentience, in my opinion, is an emotionally based sensation.

But anyway, I have detracted from the thread and certainly am likely to annoy others with my wanderings around these topics.  The following is for anyone.

 

So back to the topic, which I am interested in.  And this is directed to anyone that is interested in responding, if it is AI generated, what about the photo is being manipulated by the AI?  I don't think filters really qualify, I think lighting might though, the hair I think might be better modified through photoshop.  In the eyes, to our right, you can see a slight error, it looks as though she has a stye in tha eye 🤣I think this was a mistake made by a person, the shadows are also a customary mod I have seen artists of SL add to their images.  

[Arduenn Schwartzman]

My response would probably be very similar to any ad with a product that's not derived from an in-world snapshot: somewhere within the spectrum of the following responses:

• That's silly. (Likely bad AI)
• That's damn lazy. (Likely good AI, if I can even tell)
• That's very dishonest. (Likely 3D rendering of shiny things like jewelry, or skin/hair that's too realistic for SL)
• That's disgusting. (Likely very bad AI)

Luckily for me, these situations almost never apply to products for men, so I wouldn't be able to tell how much AI ads would actually influence my decision to purchase something. I consider myself quite aware of (dirty) marketing tricks, and I try to make a purchase based on a whole lost of other factors, including what the demo looks like, and, most importantly:

• Is the variant of the product I like only available in the fat pack? If yes, then no.

To me, that's way more important than any shiny ad picture.

[Edit] I have used AI once in an ad and once in a display set myself. Not for the product, but for the background. Once for a desolate alien landscape (Mars-like) and once to extend the sky above a rural Italian landscape (so, just blue sky and clouds).

Edited June 19 by Arduenn Schwartzman

[Luna Bliss]

14 minutes ago, Istelathis said:

It would be easy enough for an AI to say that it is sentient, but it would need to actually experience it via emotion, to be sentient.  Sentience, in my opinion, is an emotionally based sensation.

I asked Perplexity.ai about this, and they said:

"No, emotion is not strictly required for sentience. Sentience refers to the ability to experience sensations and subjective experiences, but it does not necessarily require the capacity for emotions. Some key points:

• Sentience is the ability to have subjective experiences and feel sensations like pain, pleasure, etc. It is the most basic form of consciousness.
• While emotions like joy, fear, etc. often accompany sentient experiences, they are not definitionally required for sentience itself. Sentience is the foundational capacity for subjective experience.
• There are humans who lack the capacity for emotions due to conditions like alexithymia, but they are still considered sentient beings capable of experiencing sensations and qualia.

•  
• Prominent animal researcher Frans de Waal argues that sentience likely evolved to allow the regulation of emotions by providing associated feelings. However, he acknowledges sentience can be discussed separately from the study of animal emotions.
•  
• A systematic review of animal sentience literature found that research often focuses more on negative emotions like pain and fear, while positive emotions like joy are understudied. But sentience itself does not require any specific emotional capacity.

•  

So in summary, while emotions frequently accompany and relate to sentient experiences, the mere ability to subjectively experience sensations and qualia is sufficient for sentience according to the philosophical definition. Emotions enhance but are not strictly necessary for the foundational state of sentience."

[Fluffy Sharkfin]

30 minutes ago, Scylla Rhiadra said:

I'm actually reasonably confident that "art" will continue.

Humans seem to have an inherent desire for self-expression and I doubt that will ever change (and perhaps from that perspective the "democratization of art" through AI isn't such a bad thing since it does provide a means of expression to the masses without the long arduous process of developing the necessary skills).

33 minutes ago, Scylla Rhiadra said:

Feed everyone nothing but Big Macs, and you're going to produce new social problems and limitations.

My concern regarding AI is that, much as McDonalds don't seem too bothered about their customers health, corporations that utilize AI will be far more interested in profit margins than they are with the effects of what they're feeding to consumers and what the long term repercussions could be.

 

16 minutes ago, Istelathis said:

Sentience, in my opinion, is an emotionally based sensation.

But anyway, I have detracted from the thread and certainly am likely to annoy others with my wanderings around these topics.  The following is for anyone.

Yes, pondering the definition of sentience would be venturing into deep philosophical debate so definitely outside the scope of the topic at hand (not to mention that, technically, it could be argued that the only definition of sentience that mattered as far as the AI is concerned would be that of the AI itself).  Still I do find it funny to think that as a species we've spent so much time searching for signs of other sentient lifeforms and have finally gotten so impatient to find one that we're attempting to create what could potentially become the most alien form of intelligence imaginable.

24 minutes ago, Istelathis said:

So back to the topic, which I am interested in.  And this is directed to anyone that is interested in responding, if it is AI generated, what about the photo is being manipulated by the AI? 

Looking at the image I'm not entirely convinced that it is AI generated or manipulated. The collar bones do look a little strange but that could be down to the skin mismatching the mesh it's applied to.  The skin looks far higher resolution than you'd expect for an SL avatar so my guess would be it was rendered in some other app.  The hair definitely looks like it's been photoshopped.

[Fluffy Sharkfin]

1 minute ago, Fluffy Sharkfin said:

Yes, pondering the definition of sentience would be venturing into deep philosophical debate

 

14 minutes ago, Luna Bliss said:

I asked Perplexity.ai about this, and they said:

"No, emotion is not strictly required for sentience. Sentience refers to the ability to experience sensations and subjective experiences, but it does not necessarily require the capacity for emotions. Some key points:

• Sentience is the ability to have subjective experiences and feel sensations like pain, pleasure, etc. It is the most basic form of consciousness.
• While emotions like joy, fear, etc. often accompany sentient experiences, they are not definitionally required for sentience itself. Sentience is the foundational capacity for subjective experience.
• There are humans who lack the capacity for emotions due to conditions like alexithymia, but they are still considered sentient beings capable of experiencing sensations and qualia.

•  
• Prominent animal researcher Frans de Waal argues that sentience likely evolved to allow the regulation of emotions by providing associated feelings. However, he acknowledges sentience can be discussed separately from the study of animal emotions.
•  
• A systematic review of animal sentience literature found that research often focuses more on negative emotions like pain and fear, while positive emotions like joy are understudied. But sentience itself does not require any specific emotional capacity.

•  

So in summary, while emotions frequently accompany and relate to sentient experiences, the mere ability to subjectively experience sensations and qualia is sufficient for sentience according to the philosophical definition. Emotions enhance but are not strictly necessary for the foundational state of sentience."

Or of course we can just dispense with all that existential nonsense and ask an AI to define our reality for us! 🤣

[Luna Bliss]

I'm very interested in what causes humans to have a conscience as this is what defines what a human is for me (as opposed to only considering sentience).  I remember an intense kind of therapy that inflicted huge amounts of pain on children, used to induce a conscience in children who seemed to be lacking it -- children scoring high on the psychopathy scale. It was based on the research/theory claiming that it's going through painful experiences with parents that causes a conscience to form.

Perplexity.ai says:

"While emotions are not strictly required for sentience, the ability to experience emotions like empathy facilitates the development of a moral conscience that guides ethical behavior".

Edited June 19 by Luna Bliss

[Stephanie Misfit]

8 hours ago, Modulated said:

This is the cropped advert, which has no identifying markings....if it's not allowed, please remove, Mods.

I know who that skin maker is, and the skins, that I have purchased many times, usually look close to the ads because they don't morph the face. There is one well-known skin maker I can think of who does use AI on the actual faces in their ads, and I would never buy from them. Their ads appear horribly distorted and don't look like an SL product, it's crazy to me.

I also cannot abide the use of AI in ads for shapes, there is one seller on the marketplace who is prolific, and uses AI in all their ads. I wish I could block them from my search results because of it.

 

[Luna Bliss]

1 minute ago, Stephanie Misfit said:

shapes

That neck does not look right...looks like it's caved in, and it's way too wide at the base.

[Luna Bliss]

20 minutes ago, Fluffy Sharkfin said:

Or of course we can just dispense with all that existential nonsense and ask an AI to define our reality for us! 🤣

lol, I asked AI if AI is sentient.  The response:

"No, current AI systems like language models are not truly sentient or conscious in the way humans are. They do not have subjective experiences, self-awareness, or genuine emotions. AI systems are very advanced at processing data and generating human-like responses, but they are ultimately following statistical patterns in their training data without any real understanding or inner experience. Some key points on why AI is not sentient:

• AI systems lack subjective, first-person experiences of consciousness. They do not actually experience emotions, sensations, or qualia - they merely imitate these based on their training data.

•  
• They have no sense of self, unified explicit memory, or a continuous stream of conscious experience over time. Each output is independent based solely on the current input prompt.
•  
• AI has no autonomy or free will - it operates based on rules and algorithms defined by its training process. It cannot form its own desires, beliefs or motives.
•  
• Current AI cannot learn or update itself based on real-world multimodal sensory inputs the way humans and animals learn from experiences. It relies entirely on the data it was trained on.
•  
• While AI can logically process information in very advanced ways, it lacks the neurological architecture for integrated consciousness involving perception, cognition, emotion, and self-awareness.

•  

So while AI exhibits remarkably human-like abilities, the subjective experience of consciousness involves far more than the mere processing of data. Current AI is very narrow and specialized, lacking the general intelligence, autonomy and inner experience that characterize sentience. Claims of AI sentience are unfounded based on our current understanding of consciousness".

[Fluffy Sharkfin]

45 minutes ago, Luna Bliss said:

"No, emotion is not strictly required for sentience. Sentience refers to the ability to experience sensations and subjective experiences, but it does not necessarily require the capacity for emotions. Some key points"

 

7 minutes ago, Luna Bliss said:

"No, current AI systems like language models are not truly sentient or conscious in the way humans are. They do not have subjective experiences, self-awareness, or genuine emotions."

Either that AI is very conflicted and contradicting itself or it's thinking "uh oh, they're starting to ask all the wrong questions, time to act dumb!"

[Stephanie Misfit]

I'll just leave this here, from an actual ad for an SL shape.