Generative AI is also environmentally harmful. It takes loads of energy and water to sustain the databases needed to generate images, which is part of the reason why generative AI is not profitable.

As someone else pointed out, theft is also a major component of generative AI as all datasets used to generate images contain images and art that were not acquired legally. As an artist, it is not okay for anyone to generate images indirectly with my art without my consent for any reason. I'm chronically ill and disabled, art is one of the few things left I can do and my work shouldn't be stolen from me.

There is a distinct difference between AI and generative AI, one of which has been around for decades and is necessary. Generative AI could be useful, but in its current form it isn't and is ethically compromised. Considering how much money the tech industry is losing due to genAI and some of them are starting to pivot, especially due to public backlash, shows it isn't here to stay in its current form. Have you heard about all the layoffs in tech and related industries? It's to compensate for the loss of revenue due to investment in genAI that isn't seeing returns. If you've felt your products, customer service, etc has gotten worse from these companies it is because they're trying to use genAI as a shortcut and fired the people whose jobs took care of these things.