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points by gr33nq 4 days ago | 0 comments

Brings me back to the days of going to dgl.microsoft.com in Internet Explorer to explore the library of Clip Art graphics online. This was during the Office XP and 2003 days. Even today, that style comes across as far more authentic than the tacky AI-generated flyers you see plastered everywhere now.

[–] Xirdus 4 days ago

I remember people being scoffed at for using clipart, for pretty much the same reasons people are scoffed at today for using AI (low effort, samey, doesn't fit the rest of the visual style, and subjectively ugly.)

[–] Terr_ 4 days ago

I feel like clipart was... honest low-effort (or at least low compared to bespoke art) whereas generative-AI stuff has a connotation of disrespect or deceit.

[–] Xirdus 3 days ago

I definitely remember the same kind of disrespect being associated with clipart use.

[–] xnorswap 4 days ago

Can people not earnestly cut-corners with genAI imagery?

[–] DaSHacka 4 days ago

No. I'm overall an AI proponent but even I feel an innate sense of disgust when seeing AI-generated flyers. Feels like some cyberpunk dystopia where machines have begun to organize, advertise, and run events for the 'trite human cattle' to keep them occupied.

Lazily-placed text in an otherwise blank word document that gets printed and stapled haphazardly to a posterboard is infinitely preferable.

I feel similar about LLM-generated text, though that's even more egregious. If I have to get one more claude-written email from the company CEO I'm going postal. You have a slight excuse with art as most people couldn't draw to save their lives (including myself), but to write is literally to think. And, in the case of executives they have ONE job (to lead by communicating), outsourcing such a basic soft-skill focused role to AI is just pathetic.

[–] Xirdus 3 days ago

> And, in the case of executives they have ONE job (to lead by communicating), outsourcing such a basic soft-skill focused role to AI is just pathetic.

Weren't executives always outsourcing writing to their (human) assistants?

[–] Terr_ 4 days ago

I think the disgust aspect might be from a kind of uncanny-valley.

Generative art and text-slop have lots of surface features which lead us to expect quality or effort, and then we're betrayed when we look closer. Our natural reaction to betrayal is to shun the actors behind it.

[–] FDEUp 4 days ago

The Office suite during that era was very legit.