Arting In The Ai Era

Day after day,

there is seemingly more upset and strife in the art community about platforms, artwork rights and Ai. Amidst all this upset and confusion comes a whirlwind of emotions. The question becomes what do we do now and what do we place value in now?

What About Cara

As a platform for artists, Cara is really nice with the layout and networking but there’s still limitations. There is no way to manage having NSFW art on Cara at present and server costs are rising. As a community gathering place for artists Cara is still valuable however, there is still the flaw that only artists and those looking to commission or hire artists will be present on Cara. The general public and customers will not discover people or be active users on Cara for the most part. This results in the difficulty of not being discoverable and reaching the public unless reaching out on the various social media giants that are feeding the Ai your art.

Where To Go?

At present, I do not have an answer to where to find the right people that gather on a platform that is both used by the wider public and not feeding Ai. For the power of outbound links and gathering of content creators I have stayed on X or Twitter and simply limit what actual images I upload. The struggle to share art fans make and not be asking them to face the same feeding of their art to Ai is frustrating as most would post to social media with hashtags to share with the rest of the public. To resolve this my consideration has gone to likely making a Carrd site after I look into some more, for fans to share artwork and projects in a central hub. It will be less management than running a discord for now, and more easy for fans to share with the wider public by linking the webpage. 

What Power Do We Have?

For now the more artists can manage and control their own artworks, sharing and distribution, the more control they have over their security and reach. Platforms and media changes, but having a central website or self managed platform means you can be found wherever you migrate to. Not all is doom and gloom, it is important to look back and check in with oneself to see where you have gotten to. It is so easy to toss and judge old work as lesser and negatively. At the same time, so many people still say how they wish they could make artwork that great and are amazed by things artists can take for granted (knowing the magic behind how things work or are made). So instead of treating oneself poorly and putting-down old work, celebrate your current power and the magic knowledge you’ve gained to create wonders!