It's been another interesting week on Steemit. Like many others reading this post, I've once again been on the search for some impressive new authors and thought I'd found a couple of gems. @o1eh had already picked them up and it felt like they should be receiving a bit more attention that they had been getting.
Then my Discord pinged -
...look at this, I think there are several things in common here.
This person's rarely wrong so I dug deeper. There were definitely similarities but nothing that had me 100% convinced so we started probing. It didn't take long for it all to unravel and it became clear, that this account had been generated with the help of AI. I was particularly impressed with the images submitted for Achievement 1 - realistic people holding a sign with their name on - certainly very convincing.
So I thought I'd have a go and see what I could come up with.
Meet Luis
I was quite happy with Luis. It felt like a decent start and I was able to build up a character for him. A 47 year old Venezuelan lecturer who coached football in his free time and likes to work out...
And I also needed to be ready for the request to be holding a glass of water.
Satisfied that this was a good starting point, I moved on...
Meet Jane
I configured Jane for the Newcomers' Community and wanted a more realistic body shape (AI has a tendency of producing size 10 models) - she'd need to be holding a piece of paper that I could write a date and name on so that was important.
This felt like a better result. And I also prepared for the tree photo but she wasn't happy about it...
How could this look with some text? I've not tried adding it so why not do it as I write this post?
It's low effort but does the job. I could always produce another one if the Greeter's not convinced although I should probably use a better Sharpie next time.
This was an evening's effort and it allowed me to configure a person that I could put anywhere, doing anything.
Since producing this, I've continued to enhance the "model", increasing the realism with an ever evolving, improving set of prompts. Prompts that I can apply to new people of different ages, skin tones and ethnicities.
In my opinion, the output is currently too "pure", the skin is too perfect and there's no evidence of the strains of everyday life. But this could be because I haven't found the perfect model yet.
The job of moderators in the Newcomers' Community was hard enough already but this continually improving AI layer could have made it impossible - if not now, then in the very near future.
A Different Perspective
One thing that I considered whilst looking at these profiles was the idea that we could simply accept them. They produce good, well written and realistic content. The kind of content which an outside observer would see and be attracted to, in the same way that I was before these suspicions arose. Thereby attracting additional, genuine authors of a similar quality (hopefully). If it weren't for the feeling of injustice that somebody is "cheating", this different perspective could have won through.
the-gorilla's Alternative Steemit Interface
In case you didn't know, I've created an interface to help you find content that you're interested in more easily.
Posts by voting bot users, abusers and spam tags are hidden and you can search by multiple tags - allowing you to find the content that you're interested in more easily.
👉 Launch Alternative Steemit Interface 👈
the-gorilla's Club Status Tool
I've also created a tool to help users review their club status - showing them where their power's coming from, how much they're powering up, transferring out and who they share a wallet with amongst other things.
Please use it wisely.
👉 Launch Club Status Tool 👈
