Mark Zuckerberg Uses AI To Illustrate His Daughter's Children's Book And Predictably Got Backlash

Just like Ammaar Reshi before him, Mark Zuckerberg has learned that not everyone is totally jazzed by the idea of using AI to illustrate children's books.

The Meta CEO revealed at last week's annual "Connect" conference that his six-year-old daughter August wrote a children's book dubbed The Mermaid Crystal. Zuckerberg showed off how he'd used Meta AI to illustrate the book and produce a theatrical trailer.

The illustrations seem inspired by the Disney Pixar style, and its title font bears a striking similarity to that used for The Little Mermaid.

The responses were similar to those that come whenever an artistic project boasts about its use of AI: many voiced disdain for it and implored Zuck to hire actual human artists for the job.

However, unlike when Reshi boasted about using AI to create and sell a children's book "in a weekend" in 2022, people were more charitable about Zuckerberg's use of AI in this case. For starters, Zuck is not trying to sell the book for profit, and the tech billionaire using immense wealth and access to technology to create something cool for his daughter struck some as wholesome — even if the demonstration at the event was meant to highlight the capabilities of Meta AI.

One wrinkle to this situation, however, is that Zuckerberg has recently come under fire for claiming that creators whose artwork Meta AI could digest in order to churn out images "overestimate the value" of their work.