Stray Kids’ upcoming Japanese album GIANT faces massive criticism; here’s why

Stray Kids recently revealed the release of GIANT, their second Japanese album. A promo photo that appeared on the group’s official Japanese social media account was likely the album cover.

While STAYs are excited for new music, they are disappointed by the image.

“THEIR JAPANESE ALBUMS ALWAYS HIT SO HARD WE’RE ABOUT TO GET THE BANGERS OF THE CENTURY,” a user wrote.

The image was allegedly produced by artificial intelligence (AI), according to many STAYs. To many people’s dismay, artificial intelligence (AI)-generated art is becoming more and more widespread. Some claim that this art cannot be called “art” because it was not created by humans or artists. AI art has drawn criticism for its unauthorized use of human artists’ images as training data and for its potential to displace actual artists from their professions. Many people boycott companies that employ AI for creative processes.

Due to this, angry fans are venting their displeasure over JYP Entertainment’s purported use of artificial intelligence in the quote-tweets on Stray Kids’ post. Many thought the picture was awful in addition to seeming phony.

A second wrote, “just saw the posts on instagram and oh. free skz from ai i beg”. Another added: “Why is it giving big foot 😭 come on jyp you can do better than ai trash..”

Me @ every kpop groups design creative team this year: https://t.co/QSYLSB7kVb pic.twitter.com/l84WLG8pcu

— sad girl anna 樂✰ ∞⁸ (@sadannasthetic) September 30, 2024

— Some STAYs said they would have rather an artist use an application like Picsart than just generate art via AI.

Someone tweeted, “Id rather have album covers that look like they were edited on picsart a day before the deadline than an ai-generated album cover…” While another wrote: “ugly AND ai created? bro pick a struggle (don’t, please just pay actual artists and you won’t have any of the issues i promise)” A tweet read: “We should all be mad as hell about generative ai sneaking into creative spaces. we cannot let skz’s team keep getting away with using ai to make their ALBUM COVERS of all things. i’ll take a hundred “picsart edit” album covers before celebrating ai generated garbage!!! FUCK DIV 1″

The STAYs believe that using AI for album covers is disrespectful to Stray Kids as musicians. What’s stopping JYP Entertainment from employing AI to replace musicians if they feel comfortable using it to produce the imagery instead of an artist?

A fan wrote, “Girl what are these textures stop using ai for the love of god”, another added, “whoever in skz div decided they were gonna use ai for stray kids out of all groups oh you WILL pay “. A fan stated: “i’m excited for new music but it’s so disappointing seeing this ai slop it looks like shit”. A third added: “if u really zoom in on some of the details of the rocks, there is a high chance that its ai since they dont really make sense and/or they only manually do it for the ‘stray kids’ & ‘giant'”

A few STAYs also drew attention to specifics—or lack thereof—in the picture that indicated AI’s tools being used.