Google Gemini AI stops making images of people after accusations of racism

Google has decided to temporarily suspend its Gemini image generator's capacity to create images of people, . The move comes in response to criticisms that the program misrepresented people's races in historical contexts, sparking debate over the technology's role in shaping perceptions of history and diversity.

The controversy was also highlighted by billionaire Elon Musk who labeled the AI tool as "woke" and "racist." The tool had a hard time dealing with the complexities of balancing inclusivity with historical accuracy.

We're already working to address recent issues with Gemini's image generation feature. While we do this, we're going to pause the image generation of people and will re-release an improved version soon. https://t.co/SLxYPGoqOZ

— Google Communications (@Google_Comms) February 22, 2024

Google's swift action to disable people generation in Gemini, with promises of an improved version, highlights the company's acknowledgment of the problem with the model. Jack Krawczyk, Google’s product director for Gemini Experiences, also confirmed in a post on X that the chatbot is facing issues as it is “offering inaccuracies in some historical image generation depictions.”

I’m glad that Google overplayed their hand with their AI image generation, as it made their insane racist, anti-civilizational programming clear to all

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 23, 2024

Gemini replaced Bard

Google introduced a new chatbot called Gemini on February 8 which replaced Bard and it claimed to offer enhanced capabilities. Similar to Bard, it is a direct competitor of OpenAI's ChatGPT. Gemini can also make pictures, just like some other tools OpenAI made. But soon after it was launched, people noticed it was making mistakes in pictures about history. For example, The Verge showed it made pictures of black women when asked for a "US senator from the 1800s," even though the first black woman senator was only elected in 1992. It also made pictures of women and black men in World War II German uniforms, which was wrong. Google admitted these pictures were misleading.

This is the first time an AI tool is facing flak for not introducing more white characters. Other image generators such as Stable Diffusion XL have been accused of producing more images of white people when the user was asked to create images of 'attractive' or 'productive' people, according to an article by the Washington Post. However, when the prompt was related to social services, the model showcased people of colour.

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