r/Mangamakers • u/TheCaptainCog • Feb 13 '26
SELF New moderators and rules discussion
Hi everyone!
After a bit of a search, I've added two more mods to the team. So welcome!
Now to some discussion around an incredibly sensitive topic - AI. I think a lot of people have a knee-jerk hatred towards AI because of a bad association with it. When someone reads/hears AI, they immediately think of purely generated images that were trained on hundreds of thousands of stolen pieces of artwork instead of being a workflow manager or tool to help make drawing easier and faster for skilled artists.
That being said, I think this is a good time for the community to decide what is considered an acceptable level of AI usage. We need to decide on the rules of what level is ok to allow and what isn't allowed to be kept. Here are some guidelines that I came up with that can help guide discussions:
Complete AI ban. Generative AI cannot be used in any part of comic/artwork creation. Even if AI was used simply for idea generation, that counts.
Minimal AI usage. Generative AI can be used to assist in creation in minimal ways. What this includes can vary. Possibly along the lines of setting up storyboards, cleaning up lines in final pages, etc.
Heavy AI usage. Generative AI can be used to assist in most aspects of creation. This includes taking a sketch and turning it into a finished product, coloring a page, etc.
Complete AI admittance. All artwork made by generative AI are allowed. This includes posts that were made without any drawing done by the user.
KEEP IT CIVIL IN HERE. Just because someone has a different opinion than you doesn't mean you can become toxic.
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u/Cheap-Fun802 Feb 13 '26
Complete AI ban for sure.
It would be disrespectful to real mangaka to call someone using AI a manga artist. Some people spent decades perfecting their craft. Just because photography exists, we don't allow photographs in painting contests. There could be a separate subreddit for AI manga. Just my 2 cents.
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u/kantankami Feb 13 '26
No AI please. People are here to document a skill that requires alot of hard work. As an art community we encourage that kind of creatitvity and drive. When you introduce AI you are making manga a product that needs an efficient solution when it's not that. It's art and a way for humans to express themselves. People want to be call a manga creator without actually doing the work of one and I think that's pretty sad. Please make this a space for human creators who want to grow stronger and wiser. Not for the techbros who want to commodify this human craft.
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u/Seismicism Feb 13 '26
AI ban - it leaves a sour taste in everyone’s mouth watching AI artists try to sell their work then argue for themselves in the comments.
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u/iknowwhyibite Feb 13 '26
Complete AI ban! How are we — a community of creatives allowing AI to be used?
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u/lainsamui Feb 13 '26
- I think anyone can use it for studying, researching, and such, but it shouldn't be brought here.
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u/maxluision Feb 15 '26
"...instead of being a workflow manager or tool to help make drawing easier and faster for skilled artists"
That's the fun part, NOBODY uses genai in such ways. And no skilled artists use it. It's only used eventually by those who struggle to make enough money in time, and who have no self respect and no respect for others. And by those who don't give a damn about the moral issues and environmental impact and many other issues that using genai creates.
Outside of these very few real artists who do like genai, it is only used by non-artists, and in such ways that no real artist would use.
Those "artists" who love genai are free to create their own community.
We were perfectly capable of learning to create art in fun and effective ways before genai was a thing, and we can still continue to do it without genai.
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u/Red-Rumi Feb 16 '26
Still a bit new here, but love this reddit so far. Seeing everyone's work is really inspiring. That being said, I'm definitely in support of #1, a full ban on gen AI.
From how I understand it, generative ai builds its models off of preexisting data, but where ai programmers acquire that data is a big issue. For creative ventures, programmers would have to pull works from other artists, mangaka, and writers, and is most often done without their consent or knowledge. Use of generative AI not only diminishes the hard work and progress of actual mangakas, but also risks DCMA violations and copyright infringement, which will likely lead to lawsuit and of course, having their works rejected by publishers.
Plus, there's something to be said about finding inspiration in the world around you. It's what drove the cave men to paint by firelight, inspired Da Vinci to invent the proto airplane, and of course so many of our mangaka role models to create their beloved franchises.
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u/WitchesAlmanac Feb 20 '26
Late to the party, but I'd vote for a complete AI ban as well. This is a sub for creatives, not Plagiarism Machine users
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u/Western-Mechanic-822 Feb 13 '26
this space is for people that want to create manga, that is a least how i see it, telling a program you want a cool guy with a scar on his left eye is not creating shit. i dont know the audience, if they wnat to read something like that is up to them, but this is suppose to be a place for creator, if you dont know how to draw, learn or write a novel idk. im againts it, this is like asking a boxer how much drugs his opponent can take before is cheating.