A lot of people in the comments say that the supposedly better examples in the article are still “horrible” because they can tell they’re AI and point to things that the AI did “wrong” and a human artist would do better.
That may be true if you’re working with a top of the line artist, but in my experience the average freelance designer online is significantly worse than AI. I’ve worked with dozens of budget friendly designers on Fiverr and consistently get way worse results than I’ve gotten from AI models. Will a great human designer produce better output than an AI? Maybe, but a small local event or business probably won’t have the budget to hire them or know where to find them. It’s cheaper, faster and easier to use AI to generate something that’s good enough for their purposes.
People also point out all the little flaws in the “good” examples and cite them as obvious tells that they were AI generated. I think it would be interesting to see if people could reliably distinguish between AI generated flyers and human made flyers. Sure, sometimes it’s obvious like when the AI adds those weird, cartoony people. But if the model is told not to create designs like that and stick to the styles used in the second half of the article, I expect people would have a much harder time distinguishing the human designs from the AI designs.
This is my experience as well. I run a bootstrapped business, so we don't have a ton of backing. We can't afford the top design firms, and Fable can do better than those within our budget. So it's not that we prefer AI over human designers; we just don't have the money!
Because people assume u need to actually hire someone to make art. Just let your kid draw something for your small restaurant. It's more pleasant to look at for people who didn't yet sell their soul to AI.
> Just let your kid draw something for your small restaurant.
Wait, we've gone from "pay the local artists" because AI shows you're "lazy and cheap" and "don't care about your brand".
And now whatever my 7-year-old draws is good enough.
My only conclusion reading these threads is that folks come in with their mind made up, and will argue absolutely anything so long as it amounts to "AI bad".
the point of advertising is to communicate something. If your kid draws your menu, you signal family values. If you pay a local artist, you signal investment in the community.
If ChatGPT churns out your ad you've signaled nothing. And that's obviously why you can criticize AI for every imaginable reason. That's indeed the difference and why people, regardless of how 'good' your AI art will be, will attempt to hide it, because it defeats the purpose of advertising as such.
And every person I talk to has a different take. In one case, it's that you don't respect the brand and you're lazy and you're cheap. In another, it's that you're signaling your values.
Maybe the reality is a lot of people have different feelings about this. Most people don't care and I'm mostly engaging with the loudest detractors, each with their own reason for hating AI.
>And every person I talk to has a different take.
Maybe every person you talk to is autistic with no sense for creativity at all. Thats what most of this dogshit website consists of. Programmers with no values, no creativity, no friends, no life and no self awareness. People who actually should be replaced by AI because they lack human values.
>Maybe the reality is a lot of people have different feelings about this.
yes that is the reality, but what I was saying was is that the abstract reason for that is what's called costly signalling in economics, biology or even religious studies.
When you want to display, advertise or communicate to earn yourself trust, it must cost something. Whether that's proof of work, or money, or reputation or skill, what all AI criticisms have in common is that AI costs nothing. Signalling values isn't 'another thing', it's what underlies every motivation for an ad or display and the better your AI tools get the less of a costly signal it is.
I was the person who "had to bother dealing with it" many years ago before we had AI, Canva, or even Adobe cloud.
I volunteered and designed a good amount of posters for student organizations.
Don't enjoy it but did it to help my peers and friends out.
I find it ironic that back then we had a lot of trouble finding people who were willing to design posters and promo media on print.
Now the comment section on this post has people mourning AI taking over poster making in 2026. Where was the help back then?
From the perspective of someone who had to burn the midnight oil to do it for years, trust me, I would rather not do it and spend that time with my family and friends. And judging from how hard it was to find others who were willing to do it, I think its a reasonable argument that most people were not actually willing to do the work either.
So mourn away but I wouldn't cry if I "missed out" on making posters. If we had AI back then, I would not take on any of those poster making requests.
They said: "I volunteered and designed a good amount of posters for student organizations." What do you think how many student organization have the excess money to hire a professional designer for a one-off poster? Of course they needed someone to do it for free, or else it wouldn't have been done at all!
Are you being intentionally obtuse? Try reading their comment in its entirety, and not just as individual fragments taken out of context: They most likely didn't have the budget to hire a professional designer and no one else would do it for free, so they had to do it themselves. They didn't enjoy it, and they would've gladly passed that work to an AI, had one existed back then.
It's not that hard to understand. Here, I've linked it for your convenience: <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49765890">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49765890
One of my best memories from an art class in high school was that a student organization came into our class and asked if any of us would be willing to design a poster. I ended up designing and silk-screening their poster for them and it was a fantastic experience.
I can totally see how doing more than a couple would start to feel like work, but having one or two experiences like that was awesome.
For every human good art that is cheap I can show you ten that are not. The problem is you don't know which version you'd get. Someone charges less because they are unknown. Fixing AI art is much less hassle than human one.
ajjenkins · · focus · HN ↗
That may be true if you’re working with a top of the line artist, but in my experience the average freelance designer online is significantly worse than AI. I’ve worked with dozens of budget friendly designers on Fiverr and consistently get way worse results than I’ve gotten from AI models. Will a great human designer produce better output than an AI? Maybe, but a small local event or business probably won’t have the budget to hire them or know where to find them. It’s cheaper, faster and easier to use AI to generate something that’s good enough for their purposes.
People also point out all the little flaws in the “good” examples and cite them as obvious tells that they were AI generated. I think it would be interesting to see if people could reliably distinguish between AI generated flyers and human made flyers. Sure, sometimes it’s obvious like when the AI adds those weird, cartoony people. But if the model is told not to create designs like that and stick to the styles used in the second half of the article, I expect people would have a much harder time distinguishing the human designs from the AI designs.
ha-shine · · focus · HN ↗
sevenzero · · focus · HN ↗
sammularczyk · · focus · HN ↗
w4yai · · focus · HN ↗
sevenzero · · focus · HN ↗
sejje · · focus · HN ↗
It is not, in fact, more pleasant to look at.
rpdillon · · focus · HN ↗
Wait, we've gone from "pay the local artists" because AI shows you're "lazy and cheap" and "don't care about your brand".
And now whatever my 7-year-old draws is good enough.
My only conclusion reading these threads is that folks come in with their mind made up, and will argue absolutely anything so long as it amounts to "AI bad".
Barrin92 · · focus · HN ↗
If ChatGPT churns out your ad you've signaled nothing. And that's obviously why you can criticize AI for every imaginable reason. That's indeed the difference and why people, regardless of how 'good' your AI art will be, will attempt to hide it, because it defeats the purpose of advertising as such.
rpdillon · · focus · HN ↗
Maybe the reality is a lot of people have different feelings about this. Most people don't care and I'm mostly engaging with the loudest detractors, each with their own reason for hating AI.
sevenzero · · focus · HN ↗
Maybe every person you talk to is autistic with no sense for creativity at all. Thats what most of this dogshit website consists of. Programmers with no values, no creativity, no friends, no life and no self awareness. People who actually should be replaced by AI because they lack human values.
Barrin92 · · focus · HN ↗
yes that is the reality, but what I was saying was is that the abstract reason for that is what's called costly signalling in economics, biology or even religious studies.
When you want to display, advertise or communicate to earn yourself trust, it must cost something. Whether that's proof of work, or money, or reputation or skill, what all AI criticisms have in common is that AI costs nothing. Signalling values isn't 'another thing', it's what underlies every motivation for an ad or display and the better your AI tools get the less of a costly signal it is.
opem · · focus · HN ↗
masfuerte · · focus · HN ↗
dreambigwrkhard · · focus · HN ↗
I volunteered and designed a good amount of posters for student organizations.
Don't enjoy it but did it to help my peers and friends out.
I find it ironic that back then we had a lot of trouble finding people who were willing to design posters and promo media on print.
Now the comment section on this post has people mourning AI taking over poster making in 2026. Where was the help back then?
From the perspective of someone who had to burn the midnight oil to do it for years, trust me, I would rather not do it and spend that time with my family and friends. And judging from how hard it was to find others who were willing to do it, I think its a reasonable argument that most people were not actually willing to do the work either.
So mourn away but I wouldn't cry if I "missed out" on making posters. If we had AI back then, I would not take on any of those poster making requests.
breezybottom · · focus · HN ↗
fn-mote · · focus · HN ↗
breezybottom · · focus · HN ↗
I don't see the word free here. Of course you'd have trouble finding people to do anything for free.
adwn · · focus · HN ↗
breezybottom · · focus · HN ↗
adwn · · focus · HN ↗
It's not that hard to understand. Here, I've linked it for your convenience: <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49765890">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49765890
dgacmu · · focus · HN ↗
I can totally see how doing more than a couple would start to feel like work, but having one or two experiences like that was awesome.
dreambigwrkhard · · focus · HN ↗
we should have asked the arts students! (and find a way to return the favor) i did not think about that.
that being said there were some intense rivalry between various studies, my presence may not be have been well received.
and judging how i am here, you can guess what i studied :-)
thank you for this. really feel like i got a missing piece of a puzzle reading this.
jryle70 · · focus · HN ↗