I'm not sure I agree but I'm happy to discuss! :)
Why are you calling my statement "selective memory" (am I intentionally excluding something?), and what do you mean by "way worse"? Do you consider unskilled art as not art at all (i.e. "so-called")?
What I was trying to say, is that on social media, skilled artists formerly dominated attention (likes, upvotes) because viewers wanted well-constructed, pleasing-to-the-eye artwork. I wasn't trying to say that they were the only art posters (sorry for my wording!). Continuing, now that AI is in the arena, "technically-decent" art is no longer the lower bound for pleasurable-to-see -- now, viewers are more partial to knowing that a human was vulnerable when they expressed themselves with art.
It's an intensification of internet-ugly aesthetic, which Douglas (2014) called "an imposition of messy humanity upon an online world of smooth gradients, blemish correcting Photoshop, and AutoCorrect” (p. 314). Now, online, handmaking art at all is a declaration of humanity, because you could corporately fake something full-colored and intricate, but arguably soulless, with lower effort.
Of course, I'll try to take it from your perspective. I've seen really bad human art (I like art!), and I've seen less-artifacted AI art (have you ever seen Even_Adder's generations on lemmy.dbzer0? they don't have the overshading issue at all). Of course, some may disagree that the latter is art (is art only human expression?), but supposing I do consider the latter art, my point still stands -- viewers are more on the lookout for genuineness now.
Happy to see what you think!
References
- Douglas, N. (2014). It’s supposed to look like shit: The internet ugly aesthetic. Journal of Visual Culture, 13(3), 314–339. https://doi.org/10.1177/1470412914544516