The Onion has removed another image from its website after discovering it contained AI-generated content, marking the second such incident in recent days.
Key incident details: The satirical news site took down an image accompanying an article titled “Panicked Pottery Barn Executives Announce They Have Lost Control Of The Wicker” after learning it contained AI-generated elements from Shutterstock.
- The image, which showed Manhattan’s skyline reimagined with woven material, had been published over a month ago
- The Onion’s CEO Ben Collins acknowledged the mistake on Bluesky and apologized for the oversight
- This incident follows a similar recent case where The Onion had to remove another AI-generated image
Technical context: Stock photo services are increasingly incorporating AI-generated content into their platforms, creating challenges for publishers seeking to use only human-created images.
- Shutterstock’s “exclude AI” filter has known reliability issues
- The image in question appeared in The Onion’s first print issue following its decade-long hiatus
- The AI elements were subtle enough that even an Onion content expert initially attributed the image to skilled Photoshop work
Industry implications: The situation highlights the growing difficulty of identifying and filtering out AI-generated content in professional media.
- Stock photo services like Shutterstock, Getty Images, and Adobe now include AI image generators in their search results
- Publishers working with conceptual illustrations regularly rely on stock photo services
- The infiltration of AI-generated content is affecting even organizations actively trying to avoid it
Organizational response: The Onion has committed to strengthening its verification processes to prevent future incidents.
- Collins emphasized that the issue stems from stock photo services becoming “flooded with AI slop”
- The organization is being transparent about removing AI-generated content
- The publication’s art team is reviewing its procedures for sourcing and verifying images
Reading between the lines: While these incidents represent unintentional uses of AI-generated content, they underscore a broader challenge facing media organizations: the increasing difficulty of maintaining purely human-created content in an ecosystem where AI-generated materials are becoming ubiquitous and harder to detect. This situation may require media organizations to develop more sophisticated verification processes and potentially reassess their relationships with traditional content providers.
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