Parmy Olson, Columnist

AI-Generated Art Sounds Alarming, But It Doesn’t Have to Be

Microsoft’s entry into the field lowers the chances of a free-for-all of fake images.

October 14, 2022 at 4:00 AM UTC

Parmy Olson is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering technology. A former reporter for the Wall Street Journal and Forbes, she is author of “Supremacy: AI, ChatGPT and the Race That Will Change the World.”

An example of the type of image that can be generated from a text prompt on the new AI-powered Microsoft Designer tool.
Source: Screenshot from Microsoft video demo

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Just a few months ago, the concept of using artificial intelligence to generate unique artwork seemed cutting-edge and futuristic. Pretty soon it will be as mundane as running a Google search.

Microsoft Corp. announced this week that it was making the most of its $1 billion investment in OpenAI, an artificial intelligence research outfit, and bringing that firm’s standout AI service to Microsoft 365, the company’s flagship bundle of software services. Microsoft Designer is powered by OpenAI’s DALL-E 2 AI technology and will generate any image that users type into a box, such as “cake with berries, bread and pastries for the fall.”