This is why I cannot vote for a system that in fact pits one small lobby within the creator ecosystem of SL -- those who hate AI for reasons of aesthetics or reasons of fear of competition -- against everyone else and enables them to have draconian and brutal powers to flag people -- for real or imagined causes -- and then have them boycotted or unlisted merely because THEY -- not the platform provider -- made an aesthetic choice.

Don't look at creators you don't want to see. You really only see a creator when you search on "Merchant" and not "Items". I don't see "AI slop" even when I search for the generic "shoes" -- but I try to key word more carefully and put "boots" or "sandals", etc.

Bambi Bubbles This might make sense if other people could see the same "deluge of AI slop" that you're seeing. But it really depends on how you search, what categories you search in, and what you turn on and off already, in the given affordances.

What people DO NOT mean is "things made with AI generated textures". Because some of those aren't detectable; some are actually high-quality art; some might be kitsch or be mass produced figurines you don't find aesthetic -- but no one is going to agree on what "AI Slop" is and you're not making an effort to define it yourself.

Prokofy Neva My solution works for blocking ANY store's items, for ANY reason the shopper desires. The shopper just enters the store IDs into their CSS 'block list', and the items from that particular seller won't render anymore when they are returned by searches.

Store Mute.

AI is only the example I used. Someone could 'block' a store for any reason they liked. It could be a personal grudge against a seller, or just being sick and tired of seeing one store dominate searches by abusing keywords, or as in the example I suggested, being sick of seeing the store's AI generated trash, etc.

An officially implemented "blocked stores" list, and an "block this store" button would be a better solution, since that would be usable by users of any skill level.

But in the interim, CSS injection via a browser add-on like Stylish, Stylus, etc is a workable solution for shoppers with a little bit of technical saavy.

Bambi BubblesI view your filtering device here constraining the free and fair view of the Marketplace as I view RLV: Not for Us. And really, not for a free society that does not promote coercion. If someone needs to have their sensitive eyes shielded in viewing the MP because they can't scroll through the MP like they do the rest of media everywhere in RL and SL, then you are providing a service. I suggest you sell that service and not have ideas about "giving back to the community" because then you can actually judge the actual demand for said service. Maybe you will make a fortune; maybe it will be too clunky to use effectively.

I put stores in "favourites". i refuse to put any store on a "block from view" list even if I blocked their obnoxious avatar store owner inworld for bad behaviour and thin-skinned creepiness. I believe in open markets. The MP is more or less that, even with its flaws. I am not going to downvote and double-plus-ungood some struggling artist. There are AI artists with art in frames that I buy -- I refuse to see them driven off the MP.

Bambi BubblesAgain, I don't believe from blocking from your vendor people whose blog you don't like. I don't believe in blocking the view of the world with de-render. I don't believe in "filtering" the MP which has enough filters. PS the reason I EJECT somebody stalking me to my moribund discussion group inworld is because they are not for free discussion but are for coercion so I don't let tyranny prevail. I may or may not start up a discussion; I don't have people take part in discussions who grief, harass, heckle and try to AR others. I'll ban people who as needed. Few grasp that subtle distinction. I don't think we need to filter the world more and create more special enclaves.

If I have a personal grudge against a seller, I'll still look at their offerings and maybe buy something I like. If they block me from their vendor because they don't like my blog, I come on an alt and buy it that way. That's why this is all so ridiculous. Who are you really blocking here? Competitors -- real or imagined -- of the top designers in every major event of the cartels who should stop fearing any competition from rank amateurs and incompetents -- and just people being creative and having fun -- which they should have more of too, instead of slaving over hot Blenders 24/7 to be in the next proliferating crazy demanding event with $10K booth feeds.

I'm all for third parties like yourself making whatever kind of viewer you need to float your boat. I am not for using that as a launching pad to coerce the Lindens into putting more coercion into SL than already exists.

Prokofy Neva please stick to topics you understand, then, and don’t attribute motives to me that I have not expressed.

Your misguided attempts at doxxing me are tiring, and just flat out wrong.

Talk less, listen more.

Bambi BubblesThere isn't a "doxxing" here when anyone can look at your public profile in Second Life, which is publicly viewable, and is not your RL information. To call looking at a public profile visible inworld is not "doxxing" and you undermine the validity and the necessity of the word for RL privacy when you apply it to the game of SL and your public profile.

I do not view RLV solutions for the broader public of SL to be viable. No one should be forced to get the RLV to cross a sim seam. I do not view even resident-based filter systems as viable even though you are free to make them. No one should be forced to join a Findom RP in SL to use the Marketplace, where people massively block some merchant they don't like for any reason or no reason, and force them off the Marketplace in a flash mob.

If these weren't the realities of virtuality, I wouldn't have to invoke them, but they are, and I'm here to oppose them strenuously, and it doesn't matter who you are, what your alt is, what your main is -- truly -- I will speak up about coerciveness when I see it. Imposing even a voluntary, user-based filtering system HAS CONSEQUENCES. IT DOES HARM even though you and others of like-minded beliefs (or not) think "an it harm none/do what you will" and leave the definition of what "harm" constitutes.

Look, Ms. Bubbles. I'm happy to be banned off the CANNY which is less heavily moderated than the despiccably useless Forums now because the CANNY is a sop to which we've been driven in a cosplay of "participation" and "effectiveness" where everything can be "tracked" -- or not -- and nothing can be "implemented" and when the entire system can be bypassed when one person throws up a github commit not even on the Canny (which isn't mandated by law for bug catches/fixes/features) and RAM IT THROUGH in an office hour.

Timothy McGregor this tbh

Timothy McGregor If the issue were only an individual's desire to block the store of a merchant whose creation methods he disapproved of, that might make sense, like "mute" word lists on Twitter (which BTW don't work perfectly at all). But the OP here is proposing not only that we be given the power of blocking merchants, he wants this collective aggregation of decisions to block to somehow "count" and force the Lindens to ban the merchant, temporarily or permanenty.

That's just mob rule, of the kind we had with the old "ratings" system of the early years of both negative and positive ratings that showed up on a profile, and which were widely gamed and used as a griefing tool. I'm not for putting that kind of power of veto into the hands of a small anti-AI lobby in SL.

Knowing how "AR parties" get started in SL inworld and on the Marketplace, I'm also not eager to see the anti-AI lobby then create a venue for such "parties" and hound creators out of town because they used a form of advertising or texturing somebody didn't like. In the diverse, multinational context of the Marketplace, with a huge variety of levels of skill in both creation and advertising, the Lindens cannot interfere in this sphere without losing the "special sauce" that made them different than all the other platforms: NO licensing to become a creator on the marketplace, and FREE AND UNIMPEDED entry into the marketplace at any level of skill or capacity.

He is mixing up the "mandatory check" with the "block" and it's not clear which action then triggers the ban from LL. Those functions would have to be separated out.

Prokofy Neva Yes. Mob rule. that's bascially it.

Cube Republic But it's only a select number of top designers like yourself who see this problem in their view, as I've described above. What's bothering you is what you claim is false advertising with AI images -- but who are you to judge? Maybe it does, maybe it doesn't. A system based on the aesthetics of a small subset of users in SL based on their own fears of competition is not viable for the whole user base.

Long before the advent of AI, the use of Photoshop to make enhanced advertising created a scene where some models and carefully selected multiple props made a given dress or jacket or boots look better than they did because you didn't have the full complexity of other items and props. That caused the advent of "style sheets" so the entire "look" could be shared, but as we all know, we can still end up not looking like the model because of our own set of choices of bodies/lighting/whatever. This was a built-in problem BEFORE AI and is not one you fix with or without AI being blocked. You fix it with DEMOS.

"AI Slop" could mean actual AI art as such, that someone might find highly aesthetic or not, but it is a matter of personal taste.

"AI Slop" might involve someone using AI textures in their product, or even something like a creator using AI on a wall in a build which is not for sale, and merely part of a scene where hand-drawn or created textures are used as in certain famous cases recently. Who is going to judge these different categories? It can't be one subset of the user base. And it can't be the Lindens, even assuming they will find world enough and time to cater to one small lobby -- which is what we are talking about here.

The solution to the AI problem is not to look at creators who you think use AI. Do not use "Merchants" to look them up and peruse their pages. If you think they show up in your searches on key words in "Items", then turn off Adult, or use more precise terms. You also know full well which artists you favour who do not use AI in any form for anything, and you can give your custom to them directly inworld at their stores and at the events in which you participate.

Meanwhile, the rest of us wish to be left with our free choice to view any and all offerings, of low or high quality on any aesthetic scale.

Prokofy Neva Take an image of your product in-world so people can see what they're buying. What we're seeing now are posters completely generated with AI that have no resemblence to the item being sold.

Cube Republic This is already policy. It has been long before AI came around. We don't need a broad gen AI ban to solve this. We just need people to follow the existing rules.

"Feel free to create a beautiful composite image with text and stylized graphics, but always include some accurate raws as well. Don't photoshop or hide flaws in the actual product. Some imperfections, like the visible transition from mesh clothing to sculpted attachments, are inevitable, but airbrushing them out is deceitful to the customer. Don't do it!

This goes for using generative AI, filter apps, or other image manipulation software to alter an in-world screenshot -- don't do it. Accurate images of your creations are important to building customer trust."

Cube Republic No, Cube. It's not what "We" are seeing because we are performing different kinds of searches than you and your confreres where either a) we don't see posters "bearing no resemblance" to the item sold at all -- we see plausible screenshots; or b) if we do, we don't care and scroll on and c) it doesn't matter because we can go to an inworld store if we are doubtful and see an item there and/or get a demo if necessary.

Once again, the Lindens can tell us or not, but a lot of searches are direct name searches of gatches in sets that have the key of the gatcha and these are posters that "bear no resemblance" to the item being sold but an actual screenshot. Full-perm items are exactly as they look inworld and are verifiable. Multiple categories I search for in furniture show perhaps enhanced (in Photoshop) but not "AI slop".

If I look for "shoes" now and see some "enhanced AI" images I'm not somehow fooled that these lifelike models or lifelike shoes are what I will put on my little avatar feet in SL. I don't look at the pages of creators that have massive amounts of AI generated models/textures/etc, full perm or not and at times these people are banned for copyright theft anyway.

The experience you are having is not one that I, an avid user of the Marketplace, a person with a store on the MP that makes a fair number of sales every week, a person who shops a lot for my rentals, sees such as to join the crowd with pitchforks now. You will have to compile a real set of images you've documented that you can document also "fooled" irate customers to make your case, and you have no done that. Nor can you likely do that here on the Canny.

Timothy McGregorWhat is put in the Knowledge Base as a recommended "good practice" is not law in the TOS. It is not a bannable offense in the way hoped or imagined. How do you expect to force people whose imagery you don't like to do what you think is necessary to follow some advice that is not a law? LL is providing for building trust with customers but if someone prefers NOT to do so, then the answer is...don't buy their products if you see them following shoddy practices you feel are substandard. The Lindens have not made it a bannable offense in the TOS in general or the rules on the Marketplace to "enhance an image with AI". They day they do that, they will simply lose many merchants off the Marketplace and they really can't afford to do that now with declining concurrency.

And they will lose them NOT necessarily because they even use AI but out of solidarity to those who did as a matter of freedom of choice.

Nor is it necessary when those who are disturbed by some "enhancements" need to buy from those merchants and need not search on their names in the first place. Their eyes are capable of skimming past images resulting from key word searches the way all of our eyes can skim past "sculpty" if we refuse to buy "sculpty" or "women's wear" if we aren't buying any. No special help in performing these normal and natural organic filterings of the rich and diverse content of SL are required.

Cube RepublicThis discussion suffers from a lack of actual examples. So let's take Aletta's "top for Larax" as a random search term. I am perfectly capable, as I believe pretty much anyone in SL who is at the point where they will spend money on it, even if new, of determining:

Etc. No one needs special filters to shield their eyes; everyone is a grownup and can tell. If they feel "fooled" or "angry" they can just not buy from that offering. If they are doubtful, they can TP into the store's actual inworld store and look at their mannikens and get their DEMO. No hand-holding in the form of filters is required by either the platform provider or for the user.

If there are 3000+ returns, we can refine our search and we will find the better brands that don't use AI. The market itself will do all the punishment you require without having to penalize people at all levels of ability and capacity needlessly.

Prokofy Neva Good point Prok. I still think residents can flag an item "Not as advertised" when the promo shots are all obviously enhanced - using AI or any other common tool. It's simply not disputable that when you create life-like enhancements of a product for your listing, the product in-world is not "as advertised". But yeah, this should be policy, and it's a simple one. These photos are easy to spot and easy to verify as not being raw in-world photos.

Prokofy Neva I think we do need the filters. The one thing I do support in this thread is some sort of exclusion filter. And it's got nothing to do with the use of AI.. other than the proliferation of AI product images flooding the result sets in searches. The problem I have, and have had long before AI was a thing.. is having to wade through pages and pages of the same damn product, each in individualized listings for every color in the spectrum - That sort of thing. It would be hugely helpful when you see these to have a little link that says "Exclude this store from results".

But again, in my view it's not directly an AI problem, it's a poorly designed search UI.

Prokofy Neva Speak for yourself. I know what I saw with my own eyes.

Prokofy Neva I'm not going to single out creators.

Cube Republic Well I am protective of creators against those trying to get them kicked off the Marketplace so they themselves have less competition. I reject the notion of a licensed creator class that guards the gates to the MP. The top designers already have the major cartel events; the major Linden events like Shop 'n Hop and the Welcome Area mall. There has to be some place where the rest of us can go; that place is the Marketplace.

Cube RepublicI have eyes too, and I brought a page of results where you can see a) the same creator using both drawings AND AI art -- so what? Look at her demos b) people using enhanced Photoshop on their inworld screenshots to good end; c) people taking not very good screenshots; d) still others trying to make actually human-like RL photos that are in fact AI. So what? I can scroll. Scrolling is your best friend. I know which designers are not using fake advertising, even if they use AI in textures. Some I am devoted to use AI advertising and I DO NOT CARE because I get their DEMO or look at their display inworld.

Timothy McGregorThe filters are unfair by nature and the definition is a hard judgement call -- and if the Lindens don't think they can get rid of a huge, racist and ablist poster inworld that became a subject of a Canny here, even (not by me) (!) because of "freedom of expression" then they can't go and filter out all AI that a small lobby here doesn't like. That's all there is to it. We all know that people put massive numbers of the same ads in different colours. But they do that because the interface doesn't make it easy NOT to do that and to arrange a cluster of pages in your online store AND because they are trying to gain traffic and search results. Every time I search on the MP I get thousands of results, and I am savvy enough and so are you -- without having the Lindens to shield my eyes or me having to shield my own eyes -- to not go to the last pages of the results where the shoddiest stuff is. I look at the first pages; I refine my search.

You act as if the Marketplace is crippled for use and drenched in AI. But it isn't. I submitted one page of actual results which no one else will do here. and I can see it is a mixed bag -- actual screenshots; drawings; enhanced screenshots; typical AI; really uncanny valley AI. I'm a grownup and can scroll past what I don't want to buy. And so can you.

Oh, I know. let the rich and those with resources make another marketplace, or at least a fashion feed, where AI is marked and where you can block it as such, called Primfeed. Oh, still too tacky for you? Well, perhaps you could call FlipperPA Peregrine back and have him fork and rebuild SLExchange that the Lindens bought long ago, and make a shopping site for the "better" brrands that blocks AI and antagonistically keeps out AI. Leave the Marketplace alone.

Prokofy Neva Nonsense, it's a complete free for all. Talk about hyperbole. I'm not sure how you managed to twist everything I said which was ''people should stick to the tos and provide a raw image of their product shot in-world'.

Prokofy Neva cool

Cube RepublicWhy should they do what you want in the way they make a picture? Most people do not provide a "raw image" of their product. You're going to stand there, hand on heart, and tell me not a single one of your images on the MP or inworld isn't edited in Photoshop?! You can say that about amateur creations in their prim boxes as having a "raw image" but I can't imagine you can say that of a single top creator with either MP page or HUD inworld for unboxing, or even seond-tier creator. Of course they edit/enhance in Photoshop.

Prokofy Neva Yes all my images are shot in world, I only add text in photoshop, I don't edit any of my image beyond cropping. I also include with all my market place listings a key image of the contents. I think that's a fair way to treat people ''hey here's a thing I have for sale, it looks like this and it costs that''. See how easy that is, it doesn't involve cartels, special interest groups or any of the other things you've mentioned.

Prokofy Neva I'm not saying we need an AI filter. Take that term out of the discussion. There ARE cases where pages and pages of a single product with multiple variations exist. This happens often and it's annoying. I'm not suggesting the lindens provide any magical filter that automatically averts our eyes from this.. just a filter than runs at search time:

"Repeat search omitting this store"

I don't think that's unfair to creators if I consciously decide that for this particular search, I don't want to see a certain person's stuff. That's my choice and I ought to have the ability to make it and refine my searches that way.

Marketplace listings and search are really poorly done in general, given the large volume of products that exist on the platform. These shortcomings have nothing to do with results containing AI generated material. That's not my point at all and if you'll read my other comments here you should understand that I don't give 2 ____s if people use AI. For me, it's entirely about a lousy listing system where everything is flat and the product volume is overwhelming, often having to scroll through hundreds of pages of irrelevant junk to find the one thing you're looking for. If this isn't your experience, ever, you are in a singular minority because it happens to literally everyone else.

Timothy McGregorAgain, I certainly acknowledge that you are taking the higher road here and becoming agnostic about the motivation for filters and pointing out that there are many objectionable forms of content to this or that group. Perhaps someone doesn't like sculpties, ever. Perhaps people hate ads where the creator doesn't acknowledge his build is all old-school prims and is therefore high li and doesn't even put the prim count on his page. But the "wading through pages" issue is cured by using additional key words and also just looking at the top pages, say, 6 pages deep. You are not required to wade through 3000 "larax top" pages, ever, just to see the LaraX tops. Who does that?!

I agree that if you are going to put in an AI filter for the small anti-AI lobby then you should put one in for the anti-multiple-colours lobby and the anti-sculpty/prims lobby, too. I think putting in the filter of blocking "Adult" gets rid of a lot of substandard content and adding more precise key words fixes most of it.

Everyone knows that you cannot buy a mesh body on the Marketplace. There is too much clutter and opportunism and that is actually BY DESIGN by top mesh body makers who want you IN THE STORE where you will likely SPEND MORE. I think a browse on the Marketplace can actually lead to a greater spend than a trip to a laggy, crazy merchan'ts event or inworld store but only the Lindens have the numbers on the spends per sim type or purchase type (but this should inform their decision to have blocking filters or not).

Blocking has consequences, no matter how implemented. The Lindens should not facilitate either more friction or more filtering to satisfy this or that lobby's tender eyes before they consider the ECONOMIC IMPACT on their TAX BASE.

Cube RepublicThat's admirable, but you're selling in one sector that lends itself to doing inworld screenshots: you're selling trees and plants. Not everybody is in that sector; it's a small sector by contrast to other categories on the MP. I find it truly hard to believe you don't use camera tricks, angles, settings on the viewer, whatever to take the very best screenshot possibly with years of knowledge behind it. I assure you that YOUR screenshots are not my HIGHLY AMATEUR screenshots of the type that can populate the MP. I dont' need cartels, special interest groups or special Photoshops but then my items don't sell. Other people need them or their stuff doesn't sell. Hello. If you don't need them because of your many years in SL and your perch in the market, great. But it's a big world with lots of different people in it.

Prokofy Neva I think merchants should provide at least one raw in-world screenshot. Simple, that's my opinion and I'm ending it there.

AlettaMondragon ResidentPeople who try to make a living in SL are not "greedy" -- they are using the platform as intended by its creators. I personally never quit those RL day jobs but for a small number of the very top creators, it is their basic livelihood. There is nothing wrong with that. For many, many more, it's a side hustle, or maybe just a cost offset. That's fine too. The specialness of SL has always been an open market with different levels of entree.

If the anti-AI lobby succeeds in introducing filters or marking or punishment or draconian enforcement of advice in the Knowledge Base in the form of an offense in the TOS, essentially what they are creating is . This has long been the goal of some who want to keep out all the riff-raff and make it impossible for amateurs or new people to compete with them. I'm not for licensing creators by insisting on a standard of tools or image generation to which they must conform. And that's what the AI filter or demand to remove AI content is all about.

If the MP is "filled up" with human/lifelike posters, so what? Shield your eyes. Scroll on. Refine your search. Look at only the brands you know best and trust. Don't help create a licensed class of elite creators that no one else can enter.

Prokofy Neva I think the most important thing here is that in another comment you admit you very rarely look for clothing. And I assume it's not women's clothing. It's not a "shield your eyes" or "scroll on" problem when you get 30 pages of trash with about 4 or 5 products among the results that aren't bad quality, but you already have 2 of them and don't like the design of the others.

The elite, licensed creator class is already a thing. Want to make your own mesh clothing for popular mesh bodies or accessories for LeLutka heads? They guard their creator kits so much so that you need to have at least 8 relevant products, strong social media presence, bloggers promoting your products, etcetc to qualify, but even meeting those requirements doesn't mean you'll get the rigging kits. And it's not for QA, but simply to prevent giving away the kits that people could use to replicate the bodies themselves.

When the MP is full of fake product listings it doesn't help because you're forced to shop in different ways in which you'll see ads by bloggers and creators themselves, where those with a bigger business and broad coverage are at a great advantage over smaller and new creators. So this situation is the opposite of what you want.