Dall·E and the Future of AI Porn

OpenAI’s artificially intelligent image generator, Dall·E, has taken the Internet by storm in recent months, filling the meme-o-sphere with radical imagery created by user-provided text, prompts images that cause shock, laughter, and incredulity.

A bottle of ranch dressing testifying in court - AI Creation

Craiyon’s interpretation of one user’s absurd prompt. [Image: Craiyon / angelfacepeanut]

What is driving these often-insane creations? Under the hood of OpenAI’s hugely popular creation is a complex web of machine learning first created by OpenAI engineers and released in January 2021. The more powerful Dall·E 2 arrived in April 2022 and has led to the rampant influx of Dall·E-created memes such as “A bottle of ranch dressing testifying in court”. With access previously restricted to a select user group due to concerns about the ethics of such an AI model, Dall·E 2 (and such offshoot as Dall·E mini aka Craiyon) are now more publicly accessible. Although further research and analysis of the ethical implications of AI image generators is ongoing, some biases are already well apparent. When asked to depict a lawyer, Dall·E defaulted to older white males. When asked to depict a personal assistant, Dall·E defaulted to younger females.

AI Porn: What’s the Holdup?

With sexual content roundly regarded by analysts and researchers as falling into the same category as violent, hateful, or harassing imagery, it’s no wonder we haven’t yet seen an influx of AI-created auto-deepfakes or a spree of warped images showing various celebrities without clothes. Many are now asking if Dall·E and its equivalents can create AI porn from user prompts. After all, the website This Vagina Does Not Exist has been online for at least three years, generating endless images of nonexistent female genitalia. Surely a more full-body version, complete with customizable physical characteristics determined by its users, is not far off.

A vagina that does not exist. [Image: thisvaginadoesnotexist.com]

Although the code behind Dall·E, Mid journey, Craiyon, and the like is capable of rendering explicit adult images, filters have been designed to remove such products from the range of likely outcomes. The same image transformer technology can (and almost certainly will) be licensed to or replicated by porn producers aiming to remove the cost, liability, and occasional ethical quandaries associated with hiring and filming living, breathing, conscious humans.