I recently had the opportunity to correspond with Adam Clegg (also known by his handle Arclegger) about his new project. Adam is the creator of For You, a platform in which you generate AI art, and let it float down a “river” for others to pick up. If they like what you’ve created, they can add it to their collection.

Micah Blachman: What was your process in creating For You?

Adam Clegg: I wanted to both start a project and actually finish it, and create this idea I had in my head since 2021. I'm untested, but I'm fairly sure that I have some level of ADHD/Spectrum/Neurodivergence, some cocktail of all 3 that makes me different from most people. Because of that, it's always been really easy for me to come up with ideas, and it's really hard for me to finish them. I've started more unfinished projects than I can remember, so when I started to see the potential in AI coding grow, I started to get more and more antsy about wanting to actually make something with it. So I sat down and made a promise to myself that I was going to start this project, and I was going to finish it. When I started I didn't really know how it was going to turn out—I just had a vague idea in my head, an image of a floating river and packages floating down it. I knew that I wanted people to make art and give it away, and to receive art from others who are doing the same thing. So I started there and just kept going and going.

A developer view of For You, in its most recent iteration. (Image courtesy of Adam Clegg)

Luckily I've been a game designer and game dev since 2007, so I was working with almost 2 decades of games-making experience and live service. I already knew what it was missing as I was building it, so as it was coming together I kind of knew what needed to be attached to it to make it work. The original art I had made for it was pretty funny and rudimentary—compared to where it ended up it looks better, but also it could look even better if I had a background in art, or had an artist helping me.

The first art Adam created for For You. (Image courtesy of Adam Clegg)

My Thoughts

I thought I’d offer my own thoughts on For You, after playing with it for a couple of days. The text below is my own.

I personally find it difficult to feel ownership and pride over any AI images I might generate. While I may have prompted them, I didn't create them. The same with others' generations: I can find them aesthetically pleasing, but knowing that a human actually drew something gives it so much more meaning.

I think the river concept is a really calming alternative to algorithms and feeds, because you only see the things you click on, and each one is a surprise. But after a while, it's hard to feel excited about AI-generated art—you realize it's all kind of the same. With so much AI-generated content out there, human-created things are getting so much harder to discover. The river is perfect for this, because it gives you the discovery without the stress. Though I would love to be able to share writing, or other forms of media—not AI-generated—and let it float down the river for people to collect.

Perhaps the right way to do this would be to create a sister project of For You for any human-created content—whether that’s art, photos, videos, writing, or anything else. When you stumble across a gem actually made by a person, it's all the more meaningful. Plus, it makes paying for content on For You a lot more sensible—I still don't totally understand the motivation to buy AI-generated art (though I admit I have been experimenting with pricing my own art on the river). Why should the prompter benefit from the money when they didn't create it?

For You in alpha, with art looking closer to its current state. (Image courtesy of Adam Clegg)

A Note to Readers

While I have been doing more (fascinating!) interviews recently, I do not intend for this newsletter to be exclusively interview content. I’m pondering ways to separate the interviews I do from my own musings and ideas. For now, it’s a mix, but that may evolve.

On another note, I also intend to begin posting more regularly again. It’s been a few weeks since my last post, and I want regularity just as much as you do (hopefully, you want regularity, then). Armed with lots of interviews, I’ll be attempting to resume a weekly posting schedule, at a minimum.

If there’s something you want to see more or less of, don’t hesitate to let me know. As Marcin Wichary of Unsung (a fantastic software blog) put in his call for feedback a few weeks ago, “If the very idea stresses you out, I want to give you permission to send me just your bit of feedback without any greetings, or small talk, or ‘compliment sandwiching.’”