Dress code: Does AI technology belong in fashion?

Although still relatively new, text-to-image tools have triggered controversy. In September, a man named Jason Allen won a category at the Colorado State Fair’s annual art competition for his AI-generated piece, Theatre D’Opera Spatial.

Backlash against Allen’s win ensued on Twitter, some calling it “actively anti-artist”. Digital ethics scholar Marc Cheong says pitting human creativity against computer-generated products is unfair because it is akin to “having a chess grandmaster playing against an amateur player who is assisted by a powerful chess AI”.

But instead of stripping professional designers of jobs, Ricker says the software offers a symbiotic relationship whereby experimentation with different styles, as well as planning and brainstorming, becomes faster, cheaper and more efficient.

“When you think of it as part of a creative process, that’s when you really start to see the true potential of the technology,” says Ricker.

Seidler says fashion will always require a human touch to bring it to life with meaning and finesse, but it now has the benefit of enabling anyone to create something unique in a matter of seconds – a feature highly sought-after particularly among millennials and Gen Z.

The co-director of the Centre for AI and Digital Ethics at The University of Melbourne, Jeannie Paterson, says platforms should seek out artists, providing them with ample compensation for their work, and the freedom to experiment without bounds. Only then will the disruptive, progressive nature of art remain.

“We can do wild and magical things in this place,” says Paterson. “But I don’t think it happens by accident… It’s about the platform. They have to make a decision about how they include artists. They can’t expect artists to put out their elbows to make space. They need to be nurtured and supported.”

Worst case, Paterson says AI could make fashion a parody of itself, a space lacking interpersonal interaction and deepening inequality for those that cannot access the technology.

Plagiarism must also be considered, Cheong says. If the software scrapes existing content from the web, could copyright become an issue? What if the algorithm learns from discriminatory material?

“Imagine an up-and-coming artist with exceptional memory and attention to detail set off to learn the works of thousands of artists worldwide, learning to create new images in the style of any artist ‘by request’ – from van Gogh to an amateur painter – with little effort,” says Cheong. “Any artist who might have had their work viewed by this new maestro will be concerned that the same could happen to their art.”

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Ricker says consideration is being given to banning certain keywords. “But how much does something have to be different before it’s no longer what it originally was?” he says. “Isn’t every song that’s ever been produced inspired by three or four or five artists at the given time?”

Ricker and Seidler remain confident in their platform’s accessibility, its support of artists, and its sense of community, noting that Stageverse acts as an interactive social tool, bringing communities together in a more tangible way than 2D platforms such as Instagram, while encouraging individual expression through its text-to-image tools.

They also view it as a commercial opportunity for creators to directly monetise their audience by selling their designs on the platform.

“You can now sell 3D products, these digital collectibles, to your audiences, and they can be used to unlock access to your increasing world that you’re building on Stageverse. It’s a great way for the creators to open up a whole new revenue stream to do more of what they love.”

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