Burn The Ships, GenAI Is Here and Not Going Away

I recently read something that left me genuinely conflicted. Procreate, an illustration app designed to enhance creativity, has developed a range of tools for artists. While I’m not deeply familiar with Procreate, their beautifully crafted website showcases how their software tools for the iPad and iPhone can inspire creativity.

The CEO of Procreate recently posted on X, expressing a strong dislike of generative AI and stating that they will not integrate it into their products because it harms human creativity. This is certainly a legitimate concern, one that has caused growing distress across creative fields such as design, photography, journalism, music, and other professions that rely on creativity. This conflict is also unfolding in the legal arena, where creatives are confronting companies that exploit publicly available information and art for profit.

Here’s where my conflict arises—in two distinct ways. First, this is a company that exists because of technology, yet it has publicly taken a stand against a specific form of technology. I fully grasp the distinction between utilizing technology and the dramatic cultural shifts it can provoke, but history is replete with examples where technology has disrupted cultural norms, vocations, and occupations—consider the steam engine, the telephone, the automobile, social media, e-commerce, and streaming services just to name a few.

Secondly, while I have genuine compassion and empathy for creatives over this issue, I believe Procreate’s stance is, at best, a short-term, quixotic gesture that will ultimately fail. Just as the British Luddite weavers and textile workers discovered in the early 1800s, progress marches on. The same thing happened when Kodak moved too slowly and lost the digital photography market – a technology it invented - because they feared it would disrupt their highly profitable film sales.

Generative AI is simply the next evolution of technology, designed to make our lives more efficient. Taking a moral stance against generative AI, while certainly noble, is ill-considered and overlooks the efficiencies, cost savings, and new market opportunities that it brings—especially in the creative space.

We can choose to like or despise generative AI. We can glorify it or disparage it. We can embrace it or refuse to do business with companies that utilize it. However, in the end, it doesn’t really matter because it can’t be stopped. If a thousand companies take a stand against generative AI, ten thousand more will step in to find value and capitalize on it. So, while part of me feels sorrowful, another part of me is giddy about my extraordinary good fortune to be living during this transformative time.

In 1519, Hernán Cortés arrived in the New World with six hundred men, weary from the long voyage, homesick in a strange land, and facing unfriendly natives. Fearing mutiny and to eliminate any possibility of retreat, he burned their ships, sending a clear message that, 'There is no turning back.' That’s precisely where we are with generative AI.