Ai-Da, an AI-powered robot artist, made history: it created a painting of the pioneering mathematician and computer scientist Alan Turing. The painting, “A.I. God. Portrait of Alan Turing,” sold for an incredible $1.08 million at a Sotheby’s auction. Impressive, considering that AI is the tech industry’s way of stealing the work and ideas of humans, passing it off as their own, and then conning people into paying millions of dollars for it.
The selling price is even more impressive considering its initial estimated value was somewhere in the $120,000 to $180,000 range. Someone really overpaid by like $900,000 for what is ostensibly the work of a printer buried inside a Disney animatronic and powered by theft. The future is here and it’s great.
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The Ai-Da is being hailed as “the first humanoid robot artist to have an artwork sold at auction,” which is kind of like saying your kid got first place in the science fair even though you did all of the work. It’s an ignominious distinction that means jackshit.
Originally created in 2019, Ai-Da creates “art” with the help of advanced AI algorithms, robotic arms, and cameras in its eyes. Ai-Da created a painting of Alan Turing after being shown an image of Turing. Ai-Da then created a series of sketches based on that image, which were finally combined to make the finished painting.
Ai-Da’s creator, Aidan Meller, said, “The hope is that this painting will prompt deep ethical questions as we continue to harness AI in new ways. How do we use this technology ethically and responsibly? And how can we ensure it benefits the planet and humanity, given its power?”
Well, you can start by crediting all the artists ripped off by Ai-Da, and then you can give them each a cut of that $1.8 mil.
