Flowers and Asterisks

Hello. 

I've been very busy in the past couple of months as it were. Some would say that I'm ahead of the curve for not having posted on social media for a while. I've spent an ample amount of time thinking about recent developments, and my own stance as an artist.

Personally, I don't think my art is nice enough to get thrown into the AI blender, but chances are it already has because of its existence on the net. I've been on the internet long enough to know that people save and archive things all the time. 

Things get reposted elsewhere; it's a tale as old as time as others have taken the time to save works that resonate with them. Artists are discovered in this fashion as they're found and shared by others who find meaning in their works and feel the same way they do. Inspiration is found in this fashion, onward. Art inspires life; and life inspires art. 

Originally, the point of this medium was to depict the things that only we could see in our minds and hearts, and to share the stories and worlds as we see them.

Now, as for "AI"-- There's not much anyone can do to stop it. 

As much as artists (independent, corporate, etc.) want to control how their art is viewed and enjoyed, to begin with, it was a losing fight, because of a growing fundamental lack of respect to the time and effort it takes to produce artwork, and the sense of stolen valor that comes from wanting a taste of what it means to truly create.

Things have gotten so twisted that people doubt what is real and what is generated, to the point where people are so uninformed about the usage of semicolons and EM dashes that they take their use as signs of AI, instead of taking it as a sign of human intelligence. 

This is how far we've begun to plummet from grace-- because people are so narrow-minded and suspicious of others' creativity, understanding, effort, and work. We've gotten to the point where it's easier to designate it as AI instead of believing a human could create something. How have we reached the point where we rely on machines to make and understand things for us, instead of believing in human potential for its own merit? Isn't that insane?

AI is everywhere now; and I understand that more than ever, artists feel threatened and debilitated as the human condition gets condensed into string code and quantified into mass results instead of the achievement of human spirit. Why do anything if someone can steal something I painstakingly spent hours working on with Midjourney, or whatever else? If someone can just edit my work at the drop of a hat?

But you know, I want to believe that the stories I tell, and the art that I make is inherently human, because it tells you stories and dreams that I have. I believe my work's biggest achievement, is that it continues to be a love letter to all the things I've cherished. That empathy is what reaches other people's hearts.

Which is to say, I'll be continuing forward, the best that I'm able.

It's easy to say, "don't give up", especially in a world where everything seeks to trample the hard work of others and diminish the lens of the passionate people who strive to make their dreams a reality. But the reality of things is so much more complicated, because you can't just dumb down this conversation into "Unfeeling AI versus the Indomitable Human Spirit". The nuances are more complicated; artists and other creatives feel pushed out and unsafe, as things escalate by the day, and the value of skill and hard work is demeaned by the click of a button.

But that's just it; just because there are people out there who don't understand the integrity and value of hard work, doesn't mean that there aren't people who respect and value those things in equal measure. 

The flaw of reliance on AI as a tool in this respect means that they've chosen to limit their own ability. That limit won't be mine.

So in spite of everything, I won't let a machine dream for me. I will protect myself the best I can.

So-- at the end of this long-winded tangent, in summary: 

I will no longer be posting full art on Twitter / X, Pixiv, or any other social media. The privilege to view those unfiltered things is reserved for the people who support me on Ko‑fi and other platforms like Pixiv FANBOX.

This is acknowledgement is NOT permission for the dreamless to continue to put my work into AI. I condemn the act of theft and continue to prohibit the use my works to be used for AI learning. It is not allowed and never has been.

Despite my anxieties on letting my currently public works remain on Twitter / X, I will let it stay, because I feel it isn't right to rob others from the stories I want to share.

Finally, if you're one of my followers, thanks for reading.