Comment by infecto | Hacker News Reader

Comment by infecto | Hacker News Reader

I see a trend with 404media on writing sensationalized pieces. The last one I remember was also focused on nonconsensual AI images for a startup that just got funding. Not a fan so far.

I think this misses the mark on what should be the discussion.

First, this focuses too heavily on twitter. We understand a group of the population love to rail on twitter but this is a problem for the whole online ad industry.

Second, there is a broader discussion of the legalities and morality of these technologies. These types of image gen systems do not fit my moral compass but I am not sure if they should be illegal or not. It’s a discussion worth having.

Third, the whole ad industry has this problem of moral alignment. Google still shows the scam get rich quick people. Facebook similar. It is up to companies to pick their morality on what type of ads they want. So far everyone is still trying to capture the whole market.

Maybe it's sensationalized but it seems fair to call out a specific example of profiting off of gross advertising without having to call out ALL examples of gross advertising. They shouldn't get a pass because other advertisers are also bad.

I don’t disagree with your view. No free passes. I disagree with the way 404 writes their pieces.

> focused on nonconsensual AI images for a startup that just got funding

I mean that’s a pretty terrible thing. Certainly worth reporting on!

I am not entirely sure. Not about the ai images but the away the piece was sensationalized. If you read the article it painted a picture that is all the startup did. Going to the website I could not even find the models, I am sure they existed though.

Like I said before. I am not defending the morality but the way in which 404 writes article. It’s like reading a buzzfeed/celebrity outrage piece.

Edit: I think it’s because after reading the original article I mentioned, I have a bias on how 404 writes pieces. That original article made me scared to even click the link to the company. I read a TechCrunch piece on the company and it painted a much better picture of the company and the challenges with being a marketplace/source for image models.

>I see a trend with 404media on writing sensationalized pieces.

404media comes from the Vice staff.

Definitely, I just don’t remember Vice being so terrible. I saw 404s intro post here on HN and every subsequent article from them that I saw on HN was like looking at a buzzfeed top10 lists.

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