Current Affairs has adopted one of the strictest anti-AI policies in the publishing industry as part of its new union contract. No AI-generated text may be published in the magazine, and no AI-generated art may be used as an illustration. The editors say readers will encounter the thoughts of a human and the results of human artistry.
The policy is a direct challenge to what the magazine calls the "slopification of media." Newsrooms across the country are rushing to embrace AI and replace writers. The CEO of Business Insider has said the publication is "all in on AI" and openly publishes AI-written content. Sports Illustrated was caught publishing AI-written pieces by nonexistent journalists, and guest op-eds in major newspapers have been found to be partly or wholly AI-written. The Wall Street Journal defended publishing an op-ed by hedge fund billionaire Stan Druckenmiller that turned out to be AI-generated.
The editors argue that these choices follow from corporate incentives. Producing 100 posts with AI costs almost nothing, while paying a writer for 20 posts can cost $5,000. Futurism reports that more than 200,000 jobs in creative industries have been lost in four years, describing one of the worst stretches for media employment in modern US history. Game studios are also using "art assets generated with full AI workflows."
The magazine says this is especially troubling because the AI models replacing artists were trained through the mass theft of those same artists' work. Current Affairs has rejected that path, having commissioned hundreds of illustrations and articles across its 62 print issues from human creators.
Source: Hacker News · Summarized by HeadlinesBriefing