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.
The blog also mentions, several times, that it wasn't the goal to be indistinguishable.
I think it's actually a feature when people can recognize it as AI.
Why would someone want it to be unrecognizable as AI? What is the reason people want to hide AI usage ? (other than when "cheating" in studies or examns or such, obv)
AI generated visuals are becoming a signal of A) low-effort, B) and/or unwillingness or inability to spend resources to genuinely present your product or brand.
Both of these communicate that I will probably not get a good value for my money when buying your product or service.
> Both of these communicate that I will probably not get a good value for my money when buying your product or service.
This is where I stop following. Businesses should focus on where they differentiate, and I really don't care how they generate signage if I can read it. I don't get anything by them paying Banksy to make their menu instead of having Gemini generate it. And if there is any connection to getting good value, it's the inverse: I'm more likely to get good value when I'm not paying for fancy advertising. See: every drugstore that puts generics alongside brand names for cheaper.
Yes, generics are better value, but at least from the big drugstores and pharmacies they still have clean design - they just make it clear what their active ingredient is in what dosage, mention the branded equivalent, and then put the standard drug label on it, and that's about it.
The worst generative AI posters and restaurant menus I'm seeing from newer small businesses do not instill the same feeling that I'm getting generic-like value. To keep with the drug analogy, they feel like the combo pills you find somewhere in the back of a gas station which combine 10+ random supplements to help with 20+ different symptoms. Especially for new restaurants where real reviews are limited, menus with terrible AI generated food drawings really give me the same ick - that they might not be providing any good value at all.
However, i do admit that part of this is also that i live in an area where there is tons of competition for most cuisines I'm interested in, so I can use menu quality as a differientiating factor in the first place. If enough places around me were using sloppy AI menus i would probably ignore it.
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.
berkes · · focus · HN ↗
I think it's actually a feature when people can recognize it as AI.
Why would someone want it to be unrecognizable as AI? What is the reason people want to hide AI usage ? (other than when "cheating" in studies or examns or such, obv)
RiverCrochet · · focus · HN ↗
Both of these communicate that I will probably not get a good value for my money when buying your product or service.
rpdillon · · focus · HN ↗
This is where I stop following. Businesses should focus on where they differentiate, and I really don't care how they generate signage if I can read it. I don't get anything by them paying Banksy to make their menu instead of having Gemini generate it. And if there is any connection to getting good value, it's the inverse: I'm more likely to get good value when I'm not paying for fancy advertising. See: every drugstore that puts generics alongside brand names for cheaper.
pynappo · · focus · HN ↗
The worst generative AI posters and restaurant menus I'm seeing from newer small businesses do not instill the same feeling that I'm getting generic-like value. To keep with the drug analogy, they feel like the combo pills you find somewhere in the back of a gas station which combine 10+ random supplements to help with 20+ different symptoms. Especially for new restaurants where real reviews are limited, menus with terrible AI generated food drawings really give me the same ick - that they might not be providing any good value at all.
However, i do admit that part of this is also that i live in an area where there is tons of competition for most cuisines I'm interested in, so I can use menu quality as a differientiating factor in the first place. If enough places around me were using sloppy AI menus i would probably ignore it.