DriveThruRPG Brings Down the Ban-Hammer on AI-Written Content
Late last week, OneBookShelf aka DriveThruRPG updated their AI-generated content policy, banning content “primarily written by AI”.
AI-generated “content” whether art or written word is taking pretty much every community by storm right now. And while it’s not actually AI, it is still fast becoming an issue that everyone must deal with. Right now, the WGA and SAG-AFTRA are two of the most visible places where issues with AI are taking center stage. But last week OneBookShelf, the company behind DriveThruRPG among other things, updated their own AI-generated content policy.
And as a result, starting July 31st, anything “primarily written” by AI language generators will no longer be allowed on the site. How they’ll enforce this, as the detection for text generated by Large Language Models is proving to be unreliable at best, remains to be seen. But DriveThruRPG acknowledges this will be a challenge. Take a look.
DriveThruRPG Bans AI-Written Content
Here’s the existing AI-Generated Content Policy, along with the most recent addendum:
The following policy applies to DriveThru Marketplaces. DriveThruRPG defines “AI-Generated art” as images created through the use of artificial intelligence algorithms and techniques trained on pre-existing data sets. (Examples: Midjourney, Artbreeder).
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- At this time, DriveThru Marketplaces require partners to set their own AI-generated artwork policies on Game, Rulebook and Adventure products. Any products that utilize AI-generated artwork must be tagged as such.
- At this time, DriveThru Marketplaces do not accept standalone artwork products that utilize AI-generated art.
Update July 19th, 2023: While we value innovation, starting on July 31st 2023, Roll20 and DriveThru Marketplaces will not accept commercial content primarily written by AI language generators. We acknowledge enforcement challenges, and trust in the goodwill of our partners to offer customers unique works based primarily on human creativity. As with our AI-generated art policy, community content program policies are dictated by the publisher that owns it.
There’s an additional caveat that if your game, rulebook, or adventure product contains anything generated by an AI, whether art or text or the like, you are required by OneBookShelf/DriveThruRPG to indicate that it does. Right now, DriveThruRPG is “trusting in the goodwill” of its community.
And though enforcement may be a challenge, that the policy is in place is a win for creatives.
In the meantime, we’ll wait and see how the field changes.
