Best Of

Dear IRE President Saunders,

I have concerns with the introduction of the Cognition feature and hinted future use of AI generators in Lusternia. These can be separated into legality and discerning if this use of AI adds value.

Legality Concerns

Being part of another community that has had their data scraped without permission, I would like to ask if there could be some disclosure on what dataset this employed generator has been trained on or if these sources have at least given permission for their work to be used.

Ethics aside, HELP COPYRIGHT in various IRE games states, "If you copy a piece of work over which there is copyright for use in [the game], then you may make both you and us liable to be sued in civil courts or prosecuted in criminal proceedings." With the way the AI works and a sufficient set to learn from, the phrases may not be recognisably attributable to a single source when read. However, the direction of rulings in the United States indicate the AI-generated text might not be copyrightable by IRE. Wouldn't having content in the game that one is unable to claim copyright over cause problems?

Value-Add Concerns

The advertised unique personalities does not feel true, likely because the generator is stateless. Samples show the generated text can make the denizen react uniquely to individual emotes, but I would opine not consistently enough in a span of interactions to come across as a personality. I see that there are features described to help, like tweaking the Personality Page, but this puts the onus (and cost of chars) on players with the currently employed generator.

I have also seen samples where portions of the returned text echo of what the player emoted at the denizen, which reads stiltedly and seems like a poor use of paid chars. I suspect the generator would also fall flat when given Lusternian-specific context, e.g., if I had a hypothetical fae dweller and said something about visiting Xeeth labs to them, they ought to react strongly.

I am skeptical this feature can add a uniquely Lusternian flavour to interactions. There may be some risk to maintaining Lusternia's quality lore instead, which may become more apparent with the suggested introduction of AI-generated speech to denizens other than player-loyal mobs. This much-loved game sets itself apart with unique lore and ways to engage a living world. Expanding use of AI-generated text may introduce risks to these particular marketable draws of Lusternia.

Sincerely,
a concerned player