When I first started writing as write-4-luv all the way back in 2012, I didn’t use pictures to go with my stories. Back then, writers on DeviantArt didn’t and (possibly related) TFTG writing on DeviantArt was no where near as popular as it is now.

I came back as Betamax17 in 2018. For my first post (a story), I did not attach a photo. It wasn’t until I decided to make a caption that I decided to just use any photo that I could find on the internet. At the time, I really did think there is any harm in doing so. But, as I grew older and engaged more with the internet, I decided there is a harm. There is a problem with using people’s photos for fetish content without their consent.

But then I did it again as Neoidentity when I started in 2022. The difference this time was that I was using photos that were free to use under some kind of creative commons like license. Usually the Unsplash, Pexels or Pixabay licenses with allow free use much like creative commons. Surely if they signed away the rights to the photo, then it’s okay to use them in this way. But I still had qualms, as surely when these people signed away their rights they never expected the photos to be used for fetish art. And, worse still, a lot of these licenses actually have an exception for explicit content (though I am not sure fetish writing would count as an explicit use, as that is really for photo manipulations). Still, I wasn’t happy.

Then AI started to get good. It started to make images that looked almost real. I experimented with it and found it to be good enough to tell the story and so I started using it. It was good enough and proved popular. And it’s only got better and better as time has gone on. If you look at my earliest use of AI (IDTG VITRA 01) and my most recent use (Vietnam Heights) then you’ll see an obvious jump in quality. In my mind this is a lot better than using people’s photos without asking them but it still raises a lot of ethical questions (the AI was trained on real people’s photos, for instance).

The problem is the danger of faces all the looking the same, as you can see from the three examples in the picture above. I think I have an easy fix for this and will implement it soon.

In the mean time, let me ask your opinion. What do you think of AI photos? Is it any better than using real photos of people for fetish art without their permission? Is there too much of an ethical issue to consider them for use?