Earlier in the month, a Reddit user posted a thread about a submitted game getting rejected by Steam on the grounds of the use of AI. According to the user and correspondence posted on the thread, the main point of contention was AI-generated art assets.
In a recent Eurogamer interview, Valve representatives responded by saying,
Our priority, as always, is to try to ship as many of the titles we receive as we can.
Valve explained,
We know it is a constantly evolving tech, and our goal is not to discourage the use of it on Steam; instead, we’re working through how to integrate it into our already-existing review policies. Stated plainly, our review process is a reflection of current copyright law and policies, not an added layer of our opinion. As these laws and policies evolve over time, so will our process.
Essentially, the grounds for the dismissal are not centered around the use of AI game assets but instead, potential copyright violations originating from AI-generated art trained by a human artist.
As AI technology continues to make technological advances, important moral and ethical considerations must be made. One of these is who owns the rights to artwork generated from AI models trained on copywritten works. Since most AI models pull from millions of images from the web, elements from existing copywritten work are more likely to be used in content created by existing models open to the public.
Ultimately, art forms like collaging and Pop Art are also types of art that had the same ethical questions posed at the height of their popularity. Still, only time will tell where we as a society stand on AI-generated assets in creative endeavors.
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