Issue #6: The AI arms race gives me hope and the two great webcomic eras
Welcome to another edition of this very infrequent combination of internet reminiscence, opinion and disparate links. Firstly webcomics, secondly some encouraging speculation about AI disinformation (people are getting wise, we might be ok), thirdly random good stuff from around the web.
SOMETHING OLD
I would like to advance a hypothesis, which is this: there have been two great eras of the webcomic*. We are living in one now, lucky us. Instagram has proven to be actually a very good delivery system for the online comic. A lot of comics seem to be doing very well there, or at least, they are reaching a large audience. Up to ten successive images, an audience hungry for novel content, a platform where distinctive imagery will stand out. I doubt that was ever an intention behind the development of insta, but it's worked out quite well in some ways.
You can't directly monetise the 'gram, in that, you can't charge people to view your comics there. You could show a bit and ask them to pay to see the rest, but that's kind of a buzzkill, I haven't seen anyone try it. But you can show them all of it, and then ask them to pay for merch, books, or contribute to your e.g. Patreon. And thus, I have lovely Webcomic Name stickers and jewellery and a Worry Lines Rise and Shine postcard on my fridge.
It reminds me of the early 2000s, which was my previous webcomic era. I loved Alienlovepredator (finished), Cat and Girl (somehow still going), Dinosaur Comics (still the same panels, still going). David Rees' incredible My New Filing Technique is Unstoppable would render my colleagues and I hysterical at our desks as we shared his surrealist comics around the office. It was as if he was writing them about our company, our ridiculous jobs and especially the shonky IT.
Wondermark (origin of the term Sealioning) and XKCD came slightly later and were enormously influential. Towards the end of the 2000s I fell utterly for Allie Brosh's Hyperbole and a Half, which was somewhere between comic and blog. Do have a look at Wikipedia and this spectacular list for more https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:2000s_webcomics.
At that point, it was still possible to have a successful individual creative website that people would make an effort to go and check (or add to their RSS feeds), and social media was a very limited influence in this. I wonder what effect the new era, where people consume on platforms not websites, has had on the creators, and their ability or otherwise to earn something from their work?
*I have spent almost no effort researching this, for once. Feel free to challenge this assertion. Also, tell me your webcomic faves.
SOMETHING NEW
I do not intend to keep on about "AI". I have made it clear, I am not a fan of much of what is going on in this field. However. I have recently noticed an effect that gives me a little hope in the war against "AI" based mis/disinformation. People are catching on.
The internet is full of little arms races that often go unnoticed. For example, people used to post cute animal videos with e.g. a dog doing a funny wide eyed stare and everyone would respond "oh, so cute/funny" in the comments. But then some people started pointing out that no, this is not cute behaviour, this is an animal in distress, being frightened into this behaviour. The next phase was this but in overdrive. Every animal video, no matter how innocuous, would have a bunch of attention seeking or trolling comments insisting that it was showing an animal being harmed or scared or encouraging bad behaviour, and a comment war would start about whether this was true or not.
What phase are we in now? Jokes phase! Comments now preempt the Debbie Downers with things along the lines of "please don't do this to your pet cat, this is not OK, if they learn that they are adored and fabulous they will subjugate the humans and force us to meet their every whim for eternity etc" phase. Ultimately, it looks like it is evening out, people are more aware of poor animal treatment in videos, and the overkill response is being neutered.
The same happens on marketplace sites such as Ebay. People start using a particular on-trend search term such as "kawaii" or "shabby chic" to sell clothes, jewellery or furniture, for example. But soon, those search terms become popular enough that they get flooded with tenuous examples from others trying to jump on the bandwagon. It is now hard to find a genuine example of the genre. To counter this, the original sellers find a synonym to describe the same sort of thing, and the cycle moves on.
I'm seeing a similar pattern with "AI" generated content. For example, earlier this year there seemed to be an increasing number of Instagram ads from clothing companies with incredibly elaborate embroidered clothing worn by models with their heads cropped out, selling them off for prices well below what would be feasible for such craft because they were "regrettably closing down". Sometimes there would be a long and sad story about why they were closing down.
However, if you dug into it, you'd find their website domain had only been purchased in late 2023, the clothes were "AI" generated on closer inspection and it was all a scam (or at absolute best, real clothes would arrive from a company based in China five months later and turn out to be very poor quality, not that I fell for it!). I found this trend quite fascinating (and wondered if it was all perpetuated by a single entity, or a viral scamming method).
I was also despairing at clickbait Facebook pages posting ridiculous "AI" generated animals (have you seen that little rainbow coloured owl being shared in nature groups? I can't find it now but... that). The comments would be "oh so adorable" "so gorgeous" "isn't nature wonderful" etc etc. Occasionally there would be a "it's obviously AI" comment but utterly buried.
In the last week, however, I have noticed that the balance is heading the other way. Way more people are posting some variation on "this is fake AI garbage" on those unreal Instagram clothing adverts and Facebook photos. Moreover, I've spotted content creators adding badges to their pages promising that nothing they post will ever be "AI" generated. It feels like increasingly, internet consumers are on alert for this fakery.
That said, in the case of this particularly internet dialectic, the pendulum is still swinging to an extent. In many cases, these posters are still wrong. In one example, the images were real, just stolen. The scam wasn't "AI" based, but it was still a scam.
But this is giving me hope. There is a lot of justifiable concern about fake "AI" imagery duping people, but it doesn't always recognise the way that the internet community tends to pendulum in this way, these constant back and forths, these little arms races. It doesn't mean that everyone will suddenly get really savvy, but also, it's a factor that should be taken into account when predicting the response to these new technologies. I'd rather not have the fakery in the first place, but then, maybe the outcome won't be as bad as I and many others have feared.
After all, you might get duped once by a fake "AI" generated Willy Wonka chocolate experience advert, but surely nobody is going to make that mistake twice.
SOMETHING BORROWED
Things that I have been reading and thinking about. Inclusion doesn’t necessarily mean full endorsement. I try to credit where I saw these shared originally but don't always remember, apologies.
The loneliness of the digital creator: on uncertainty and the impact you can’t measure. Yes, it's my blog! I have a feeling I have forgotten to share any of my own actual stuff on here? Anyway, my last one was on embracing uncertainty around the impact of your online content (but also, letting creators know if something moves you).
I was going to post a single White Pube review for something but really, just sign up to their stuff and read it all. They write like no others about culture and art.
I don't remember this webcomic, but the story is fascinating: "This webcomic made it okay to be sad online. Then its artist vanished."
Downpour is COMING SOON. This super accessible photo based game engine by V Buckenham has so much scope for creating fabulous playful stuff.
This pottery blew my mind.
Not long to go on this contemporary rural folk horror RPG Kickstarter, a combination which is very much my bag, and perhaps yours too.
More shots fired in the AI arms race. This is beautiful. What is happening here? Well, Zoey realises that Anser is a "AI"/LLM based twitter bot, and gives it new instructions to follow with joyful consequences.
My current favourite BlueSky account is a charming bird artist.
People First Tech provides sensible policy recommendations on digital to the likely next government and honestly it's so good to see a reasonable plan instead of the usual hype and nonsense.
Do you need a music mix to get things done to? This worked for me.