Gamers are renting out GPU power for AI porn generation in return for Fortnite skins

[zohaibahd]

WTF?! If you're a gamer lending your GPU power to a cloud computing company called Salad, there's a good chance it's being used to create AI-generated adult content in exchange for video game currencies and items. Yep, you read that right.

According to a report from 404 Media, Salad has found a clever way to massively scale up AI content generation, including images, videos, and text, by outsourcing the heavy computational work to the powerful GPUs found in gaming rigs. Gamers who sign up to "rent" out their idle GPUs get paid in digital goods like Fortnite cosmetics, Roblox credit, Minecraft skins, and other gaming-related rewards through the Salad store.

It's easy money – powerful graphics cards are well suited for the processing power needed to run AI models like Stable Diffusion to generate media. But here's the kicker: part of the AI content Salad is generating using rented GPU power is adult content.

When signing up, Salad gives users the choice to opt out of being involved in generating explicit adult content. However, the company's Discord mods have reportedly claimed that by default, everyone is opted out, and some countries don't allow opting in due to local laws. Salad's website also suggests that users who don't generate adult content could make less money.

"There might be times where you earn a little less if we have high demand for certain adult content workloads, but we don't plan to make those companies the core of our business model," reads an excerpt from their FAQs.

The real shadiness emerges with Salad's involvement with Civitai, a platform where AI models are shared and images are generated. 404 Media notes that Civitai has previously allowed non-consensual porn generation, including one particularly disturbing incident where AI-generated images "could be categorized as child pornography" slipped through from another company working with Civitai.

Neither Salad nor Civitai have been transparent about just how prevalent non-consensual and illegal content generation is among the reams of AI porn being cranked out. But given Civitai's track record and the sheer scale of opaque processing power Salad is leveraging, it's quite possible that some messed-up stuff is being created, unbeknownst to the gamers whose GPUs are being rented.

It's a grim situation emblematic of the larger ethical pitfalls emerging in commercial AI development – companies rushing to stake claims and scale without adequate safeguards, transparency, or accountability measures in place.

404 Media speculated that Salad marks all Stable Diffusion image jobs as "adult content" by default because it can't actually verify what individual users are generating.

So while you may just be hoping to score some free Fortnite goodies by lending your GPU to Salad's cloud network, there's a chance your hardware is churning out digital depravity behind the scenes.

Let's just hope more thoughtful regulation emerges before the metastasizing of non-consensual AI porn renders the entire sector a dumpster fire.

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Gamers are renting out GPU power for AI porn generation in return for Fortnite skins

 

[NicktheWVAHick]

There’s something very unsettling about having hundreds of strangers engaging in AI-sex in my home office when I’m not there.
Just sayin….

 

[Lew Zealand]

Haven't read the article yet but want to compliment the top-tier headline on this article.

 

[m4a4]

Sounds like a great way to subsidize a GPU nowadays (since Ethereum mining no longer pays out much)...

 

[Squid Surprise]

Well, if you're going to make renting out GPUs legal, why not use them for porn? If you can find something more sought after on the net, I'm sure people would be happy to buy your GPU time for that as well...

People can be righteous all they want - but the internet's main attraction is still porn.

 

[Atmajaya2020]

Well, I guess that's also one way to use the GPU outside of gaming..

 

[hahahanoobs]

Of course they are.

 

[anastrophe]

People can be righteous all they want - but the internet's main attraction is still porn.

By what metric? Yes, there's a lot of porn on the 'net. I seriously doubt that by any metric* it's the "main attraction".

*excepting "interest in porn"

 

[Squid Surprise]

By what metric? Yes, there's a lot of porn on the 'net. I seriously doubt that by any metric* it's the "main attraction".

*excepting "interest in porn"

Well, old reports used to state that about 70% of the content downloaded on the net was porn… that’s probably down a bit since the rise of streaming services - but it’s hard to get an accurate number as porn sites are legion and people tend to be ashamed of their porn watching so don’t answer surveys accurately.

People are hard-wired for two basic things: food and sex… since food can’t be directly eaten from the internet (but it can be ordered), sex tends to be quite popular. Again, nothing inherently wrong with it as long as everyone involved is consenting…

 

[anastrophe]

Well, old reports used to state that about 70% of the content downloaded on the net was porn… that’s probably down a bit since the rise of streaming services - but it’s hard to get an accurate number as porn sites are legion and people tend to be ashamed of their porn watching so don’t answer surveys accurately.

People are hard-wired for two basic things: food and sex… since food can’t be directly eaten from the internet (but it can be ordered), sex tends to be quite popular. Again, nothing inherently wrong with it as long as everyone involved is consenting…

If we were fruit flies, that hard-wiring might be true. However, humans are a tad more complex than that. In order of survival importance:
1. air
2. water
3. food
4. shelter
5. ensuring the previous four are available as much as possible and in order by rank
6. amusement
7. sex, great fun, but for individual survival unnecessary. For the species, necessary; however satisfying the previous necessities always supersedes the species.

Am being exceptionally pedantic this evening. That's an amusement of mine.

 

[Squid Surprise]

If we were fruit flies, that hard-wiring might be true. However, humans are a tad more complex than that. In order of survival importance:
1. air
2. water
3. food
4. shelter
5. ensuring the previous four are available as much as possible and in order by rank
6. amusement
7. sex, great fun, but for individual survival unnecessary. For the species, necessary; however satisfying the previous necessities always supersedes the species.

Am being exceptionally pedantic this evening. That's an amusement of mine.

Except that 1: air isn’t something we strive for - it’s something we take for granted - if we don’t have it we die, but it’s not really something you need to go and get…
2: water counts as food - and as for its necessity - much like air we simply take it for granted since we’d die without it.
3: food - yep!
4: shelter is not something hard-wired into our species and while there are still “homeless” people out there, most people who have internet already have shelter.
5: see above
6: amusement does NOT rank above sex (although many equate sex with amusement) - the human race (and all mammals) MUST have sex in order to continue their species.
7: there ya have it!

Watch some commercials… watch some TV… even if it isn’t porn, there’s probably some attractive person (usually female) “selling” said entertainment… you rarely have ugly people on screen - unless they’re the evil monsters…

 

[anastrophe]

Except that 1: air isn’t something we strive for - it’s something we take for granted - if we don’t have it we die, but it’s not really something you need to go and get…
2: water counts as food - and as for its necessity - much like air we simply take it for granted since we’d die without it.
3: food - yep!
4: shelter is not something hard-wired into our species and while there are still “homeless” people out there, most people who have internet already have shelter.
5: see above
6: amusement does NOT rank above sex (although many equate sex with amusement) - the human race (and all mammals) MUST have sex in order to continue their species.
7: there ya have it!

Watch some commercials… watch some TV… even if it isn’t porn, there’s probably some attractive person (usually female) “selling” said entertainment… you rarely have ugly people on screen - unless they’re the evil monsters…

I think you're looking at it through a 'first world' lens, of which there's nothing wrong with that. But about two billion people lack consistently available, safe to drink water. Yes, 'we' get to take it for granted, hell we flush the toilet with drinking water.
Shelter is pretty much necessary for human survival. While it stretches the definition a bit, it still fits: clothing. Clothing and shelter are two parts of a system that keeps most of us from running around naked and freezing to death in winter.

However, I think we agree more than we disagree, so, there ya go.

 

[Squid Surprise]

I think you're looking at it through a 'first world' lens, of which there's nothing wrong with that. But about two billion people lack consistently available, safe to drink water. Yes, 'we' get to take it for granted, hell we flush the toilet with drinking water.
Shelter is pretty much necessary for human survival. While it stretches the definition a bit, it still fits: clothing. Clothing and shelter are two parts of a system that keeps most of us from running around naked and freezing to death in winter.

However, I think we agree more than we disagree, so, there ya go.

We’re talking about people who have high-powered GPUs and are using the internet… this is clearly a first world issue…

 

[anastrophe]

We’re talking about people who have high-powered GPUs and are using the internet… this is clearly a first world issue…

Then why did you reduce the argument to:
"People are hard-wired for two basic things: food and sex…"

They aren't. They're hardwired for many things. Simplistic arguments just aren't very compelling, particularly when making an unsupported claim that
"but the internet's main attraction is still porn."

It's not, not even remotely, according to this:

Ranked: The Top 50 Most Visited Websites in the World

In this visualization, we rank the top 50 websites that receive the most internet traffic, from Google to CNN.

www.visualcapitalist.com

Porn is pretty far down the list.

People have many interests. Sex is one of them. It isn't driving the internet.

 

[MasterAce]

Then why did you reduce the argument to:
"People are hard-wired for two basic things: food and sex…"

They aren't. They're hardwired for many things. Simplistic arguments just aren't very compelling, particularly when making an unsupported claim that
"but the internet's main attraction is still porn."

It's not, not even remotely, according to this:

Ranked: The Top 50 Most Visited Websites in the World

In this visualization, we rank the top 50 websites that receive the most internet traffic, from Google to CNN.

www.visualcapitalist.com

Porn is pretty far down the list.

People have many interests. Sex is one of them. It isn't driving the internet.

Guys have different priorities than girls. Obviously I don’t know which you are, but trying to argue that sex is not that important tends to show a bit color in that respect…

 

[Squid Surprise]

Then why did you reduce the argument to:
"People are hard-wired for two basic things: food and sex…"

They aren't. They're hardwired for many things. Simplistic arguments just aren't very compelling, particularly when making an unsupported claim that
"but the internet's main attraction is still porn."

It's not, not even remotely, according to this:

Ranked: The Top 50 Most Visited Websites in the World

In this visualization, we rank the top 50 websites that receive the most internet traffic, from Google to CNN.

www.visualcapitalist.com

Porn is pretty far down the list.

People have many interests. Sex is one of them. It isn't driving the internet.

You can’t figure it out by the top ranked websites… there are MILLIONS of porn sites - many of which don’t report numbers as they live in legally “grey” areas and tend to switch addresses frequently…

And while people have many interests - sex is one of the big ones. Ask any advertiser: sex sells.

It’s not like I “reduced the argument”. I simply defended the prevalence of porn on the web.

Remember the actual topic of this article. Generating porn is crucial as it is one of the main “purposes” of the internet.

If someone was using GPUs to generate philosophical arguments on the merits of blue jeans, you’d see me being far more indignant.

 

[anastrophe]

Guys have different priorities than girls. Obviously I don’t know which you are, but trying to argue that sex is not that important tends to show a bit color in that respect…

The classic dodge of putting words in someone's mouth then attacking them for them.

 

[anastrophe]

You can’t figure it out by the top ranked websites… there are MILLIONS of porn sites - many of which don’t report numbers as they live in legally “grey” areas and tend to switch addresses frequently…

That's one metric, I'll give you that. I would still suggest that while many people do visit porn sites, myself included, it is one of many interests I have, and I spend far more time elsewhere, as porn isn't the most important thing in my life.

And while people have many interests - sex is one of the big ones. Ask any advertiser: sex sells.

No kidding.

It’s not like I “reduced the argument”. I simply defended the prevalence of porn on the web.

You're exaggerating the prevalence of porn on the web, and the degree to which people place importance on it.

Take note - and this is for "MasterAce" as well: arguing that someone is exaggerating the prevalence of porn is NOT arguing that it is NOT prevalent.

Remember the actual topic of this article. Generating porn is crucial as it is one of the main “purposes” of the internet.

Porn is one function the internet offers. It's not hard to review that top sites page, which has a lot of data in it, and see that the porn sector, while a meaningful proportion of the total, doesn't come close to the traffic on the net related to other interests people have.

But, I can't speak for you. If your only outlet for sex is porn sites, and you spend all day on them, then, well, good for you. I'm happy for you. Be your best self.

But it's all too common for an individual to conflate their own specific interests as being shared to the same degree by other people.

If someone was using GPUs to generate philosophical arguments on the merits of blue jeans, you’d see me being far more indignant.

Why would that make you indignant? Because it would be reducing the amount of porn they generate that you could otherwise consume?

If so, seek professional help.

 

[Squid Surprise]

That's one metric, I'll give you that. I would still suggest that while many people do visit porn sites, myself included, it is one of many interests I have, and I spend far more time elsewhere, as porn isn't the most important thing in my life.

I’m not arguing it’s the most important part of everyone’s internet usage - but it’s among the top interests for almost everyone… kind of like how they decide MVP votes in sports, 2nd, 3rd and 4th place votes count…

You're exaggerating the prevalence of porn on the web, and the degree to which people place importance on it.

Take note - and this is for "MasterAce" as well: arguing that someone is exaggerating the prevalence of porn is NOT arguing that it is NOT prevalent.


Porn is one function the internet offers. It's not hard to review that top sites page, which has a lot of data in it, and see that the porn sector, while a meaningful proportion of the total, doesn't come close to the traffic on the net related to other interests people have.

But, I can't speak for you. If your only outlet for sex is porn sites, and you spend all day on them, then, well, good for you. I'm happy for you. Be your best self.

But it's all too common for an individual to conflate their own specific interests as being shared to the same degree by other people.

If anything, I’m probably understating it - very few people will admit that they search for porn… they are ashamed because of society… the fact that you’re reduced to insulting me by stating that it’s my main interest displays my point quite clearly.

Why would that make you indignant? Because it would be reducing the amount of porn they generate that you could otherwise consume?

If so, seek professional help.

No - because wasting all that GPU power and electricity, coding-time, etc on something 1% of the population will make use of is shameful.

As porn is something almost everyone “makes use of”, I see no problem in idle GPUs being used to generate more of it.

 

[RudyBob]

The more actors and models removed from porn the better for them and society

 

[anastrophe]

I’m not arguing it’s the most important part of everyone’s internet usage - but it’s among the top interests for almost everyone… kind of like how they decide MVP votes in sports, 2nd, 3rd and 4th place votes count…

And again, this is where we're left with your personal speculations about how much/how important internet porn is to everyone on earth who has an internet connection. You're perfectly free to speculate all you want; claiming emphatically that internet porn is the second most important thing in people's lives besides food is fine, but you have to acknowledge it has no practical value.

If anything, I’m probably understating it - very few people will admit that they search for porn… they are ashamed because of society… the fact that you’re reduced to insulting me by stating that it’s my main interest displays my point quite clearly.

Again, it's all speculations. You made the claims, I presented speculations about how important it is to you. I guess that rhetorical method failed.

No - because wasting all that GPU power and electricity, coding-time, etc on something 1% of the population will make use of is shameful.

As porn is something almost everyone “makes use of”, I see no problem in idle GPUs being used to generate more of it.

"almost everyone". Again, it looks like you are basing this on your own interests and extrapolating it to 'everyone', which is a fallacy.

I've seen estimates from 70% to 92% of men watch pornography, while for women estimates range from 26% to 60% of women. The stats are hugely influenced by the super-segments from which they come; wealth, country, age, all play significantly into each subset.

"Almost everyone" has no meaningful value at all.

I don't care what people use their GPU's for. I don't even care if sickos use it to generate child porn, so long as they keep it to themselves. Better a pedophile satisfy his urges to pixels on a screen rather than an actual child. In that regard, it may actually be a benefit to society at large.

 

[Squid Surprise]

I don't care what people use their GPU's for.

Then why are you commenting (and continuing to comment) in this thread?

I’m simply trying to make the simple point that generating porn is not a terrible thing for GPUs to be doing as TONS of people consume porn.

This isn’t speculation - it’s FACT!

 

[anastrophe]

Then why are you commenting (and continuing to comment) in this thread?

For the same reason you are: amusement.

I’m simply trying to make the simple point that generating porn is not a terrible thing for GPUs to be doing as TONS of people consume porn.

Never once said that it's wrong/bad/terrible/immoral/reprehensible/deviant/evil or whatever adjective you want. Nor did I ever argue that sex isn't important, as MasterAce suggested.

This isn’t speculation - it’s FACT!

So, so far we have:
"the internet's main attraction is still porn."
"among the top interests for almost everyone"
"porn is something almost everyone “makes use of”"
to
"TONS of people consume porn"

Again, I think you're extrapolating the degree to which you may consume porn onto all of the above, which is just weak. Split it down by wealth, nation, prevailing laws, and particularly age cohort, and it's just making a blind statement that is true, but simply isn't particularly meaningful.

TONS of people do not consume porn, as well.

That is also a fact, although the distinction of tons....are we talking long tons, short tons, metric tons?

I'm just poking at you, don't be too serious about it. I refer back to what I wrote earlier in the thread: I think we agree more than we disagree, so, there ya go.

 

[MasterAce]

For the same reason you are: amusement.

Never once said that it's wrong/bad/terrible/immoral/reprehensible/deviant/evil or whatever adjective you want. Nor did I ever argue that sex isn't important, as MasterAce suggested.


So, so far we have:
"the internet's main attraction is still porn."
"among the top interests for almost everyone"
"porn is something almost everyone “makes use of”"
to
"TONS of people consume porn"

Again, I think you're extrapolating the degree to which you may consume porn onto all of the above, which is just weak. Split it down by wealth, nation, prevailing laws, and particularly age cohort, and it's just making a blind statement that is true, but simply isn't particularly meaningful.

TONS of people do not consume porn, as well.

That is also a fact, although the distinction of tons....are we talking long tons, short tons, metric tons?

I'm just poking at you, don't be too serious about it. I refer back to what I wrote earlier in the thread: I think we agree more than we disagree, so, there ya go.

I’m just suggesting that half of the human population see different priorities when it comes to internet. Porn is billion dollar business for a reason.

Gender equality is often taken so far as to claim men and women have equal needs and desires, which is patently false.

for men, internet might very well be 70% porn, it’s not an entirely false statement from a male perspective.

 

[anastrophe]

I’m just suggesting that half of the human population see different priorities when it comes to internet. Porn is billion dollar business for a reason.

Gender equality is often taken so far as to claim men and women have equal needs and desires, which is patently false.

for men, internet might very well be 70% porn, it’s not an entirely false statement from a male perspective.

As with the other guy, I think we probably agree more than we disagree. I just disagree with blanket claims that porn is the primary reason people (primarily men) use the internet.

Obviously it gets a huge amount of use. So does news, Netflix, Spotify/Pandora, Youtube, Facebook, Twitter, tiktok, etc., and by and large their cumulative usage far outstrips porn by most metrics.

If I was twenty, I'd probably say it's totally obvious porn is A-#1. Personal experience is no substitute for actual data, at least if you're making specific claims about X, Y, or Z.