Christmas gift! X Allows Anyone to Edit Others Illustrations
Illustrators around the world received a huge Christmas “gift” from Twitter (or X, if you prefer to call it that). It is now possible to edit, directly on the platform, any tweet that contains illustrations. The illustrator Wayupata posted the following very sad tweet:
“Somehow this button was added without me noticing, and now I’m rolling my eyes. Just by pressing it, anyone can edit images with AI.”
The button appears in the lower-right corner of the image, and you can edit any tweet that contains an image — and this also includes PHOTOS, since I tested it myself and edited photos of cosplayers.
I took the artwork above from Wayupata and asked the AI only to color the illustration, and this was the result:
It gave me two options: one with white clothes and another with blue clothes. I can already imagine the problems we’ll face if this spreads, with anyone being able to edit all kinds of illustrations and photos out there.
Wayupata commented further on the situation:
“I don’t understand much about laws, but if you post something generated using this function, wouldn’t that be a copyright violation??? Anyone thinking of using it should be cautious.”
Other people also shared their opinions on the case:
- I was viewing this through the smartphone app, but it seems possible to edit through the app as well…
- I tested it on my phone with one of my own drawings to see if that option would appear, but it didn’t show up at all…
- Seriously…!? It doesn’t appear on mine either… could there be some specific setting…?
- “Post Image” and “Create Video with Grok” already existed, but they were hidden, so almost nobody used them… Since this one is in a very visible place, it seems a lot more people will end up using it. In the Twitter kingdom, they probably think posting something edited like this is legally fine…
- This is way too heavy, it makes me want to cry… With so many artists clearly saying they don’t want their art used for AI training, the system just ignores it. It’s hell. Don’t give moral justification to ignorant people who don’t understand copyright at all.
- It doesn’t show up for me either… maybe it depends on the settings.
- Because the operation is so simple, the risks of misuse and privacy concerns become even more important.
- This is really dangerous… Anyone can edit with AI just by clicking, it’s far riskier than I imagined…
- I completely understand the anxiety and concerns regarding this content being added as a new feature.
- Precisely because it’s easy to use, concerns about misuse and privacy become even more important.
Now we’ll have to see what happens over time. Japanese websites are already talking about a possible “exodus” of users leaving Twitter for other social networks such as Bluesky (which isn’t very friendly toward anime), among others.