Paizo bans AI-created art and content in its RPGs, including community-created work

polygon.com:

With the sudden rise of cheap, easy-to-use AI art and text generators changing how different creative fields approach their business, ethical and legal questions about the use of computer-generated work are becoming more common and heated. RPG publisher Paizo, creator of Pathfinder and Starfinder, took a hardline stance against AI-generated work, with posts on social media and the company’s blog committing to “the work of human professionals” and promising a contractual ban on AI-generated art and text.

There have been many questions about the future of AI art and text within the TTRPG industry. The short answer is: Paizo stands with artists and writers. pic.twitter.com/7G0Xj3HvuH

Paizo, which in 2021 became the first tabletop role-playing game company to unionize, has previously taken creator-oriented stances, including committing to a legal battle for the Open Game License (OGL) that made Pathfinder and many other Dungeons & Dragons-inspired games possible, and promising to help create and support an open-source “system-agnostic license” that could replace the OGL if Dungeons & Dragons owner Wizards of the Coast changes the license.

In the new posts, Paizo states that it’s changing its contracts to add language ensuring all content is created by humans rather than machines, and that it plans to ban AI-generated work from its community marketplaces as well.

Over the last few months, the world has seen a huge upsurge in interest, use, and quality of algorithm-generated imagery and text. Since we launched the company in 2002, Paizo has made its reputation with the assistance of countless traditional artists and writers, who are just as integral to the success of our games as our in-house editors, art directors,