There are a lot of things reasonable people would use AI for. This is not one of them. This is a crazy idea. Just plain bonkers. No sense to be found. "Oh, you want to see what's at that location? How about we make something up for you?"
Does this move us closer to needing registries of authentic images? (White-listing? Only a partial solution.)
Google's response today, in addition to removing nano banana from Earth, was that people should just use Google's synthID(?) AI detection app, to determine if this is a blacklisted (effectively) image.
Of course that's impractical because a million people could quickly receive the image .. the image would make an impression on them before detection. And, this would also mean that Google's AI detection software needs to be ran by every human for every image that they view, in order to determine if it's valid. So, let's say that's 100 images, so that's a 100 to the millionth power? (Did I really get a CS degree?) I think it's just 100 million visits to Google synthID tool.. lol.
If we go with a white listing approach then we know that we should trust the image. If we go with a blacklisting approach then we only know that we should not trust the image, which we already knew before we ran the tool....
Watermarking is for fools. Those doing the generation and watermarking will control what is perceived as false or true. Watermarks have historically been about proof of ownership or origin. Watermarking fake creations works in reverse, all of a sudden what's void of watermarking is true, but those that control the watermarking can either add them to truths to turn them into fakes or skip watermarking for certain people or organizations, making their fake creations become truths.
I've toyed with the idea of issuing LTE IMEI-like identity numbers for digital cameras (and a LTE IMSI/SIM-like identity number to identify a paying accountholder who wishes to subscribe to an image-creator attestation service).
Each photograph would attach cryptographically-verifiable metadata attesting to both the identity of the camera and the person who owns it. (Say, m="Camera 123 owned by subscriber 456 created a raw 20MP image with sha 0xdeadbeef... at time 2026-01-23 4:56pm" countersigned by both the device and subscriber keys).
Image compression would be an immediate issue. Key lifetime management would be another major issue, as would key revocation behavior. Device manufacturers would take time to buy in and phase in hardware support. Consumers would object to yet another subscription service. Privacy and freedom-of-the-press advocates would probably have something to say about establishing a norm where we doubt the legitimacy of any digital images that refuse to "out" their creator.
And other than those pesky little non-starters, I've yet to find anything wrong with it :'-)
Even the Microsoft Kin lasted 48 days (I thought it had been cancelled on launch day, but digging back it was just the tech press saying "This was a mistake from Day One" which is certainly true, but not the same thing :-)
When they talk about everybody losing their jobs, that doesn’t bother them one bit. In fact, they seem to be truly happy when they talk about that. But this, Oh No!
It doesn't. Whoever is above the Nano Banana 2 team at Google is pushing some agenda that forcibly integrates their AI slop image generator into other teams' products.
There are a lot of things reasonable people would use AI for. This is not one of them. This is a crazy idea. Just plain bonkers. No sense to be found. "Oh, you want to see what's at that location? How about we make something up for you?"
Yeah this has “PM trying to put an AI release on their promo packet” written all over it.
I can't wait for nano banana on pathology images.
Does this move us closer to needing registries of authentic images? (White-listing? Only a partial solution.)
Google's response today, in addition to removing nano banana from Earth, was that people should just use Google's synthID(?) AI detection app, to determine if this is a blacklisted (effectively) image.
Of course that's impractical because a million people could quickly receive the image .. the image would make an impression on them before detection. And, this would also mean that Google's AI detection software needs to be ran by every human for every image that they view, in order to determine if it's valid. So, let's say that's 100 images, so that's a 100 to the millionth power? (Did I really get a CS degree?) I think it's just 100 million visits to Google synthID tool.. lol.
If we go with a white listing approach then we know that we should trust the image. If we go with a blacklisting approach then we only know that we should not trust the image, which we already knew before we ran the tool....
- https://www.digitaldigging.org/p/how-to-plant-a-nuclear-plan... original article is more interesting, also linked in above main article
Watermarking is for fools. Those doing the generation and watermarking will control what is perceived as false or true. Watermarks have historically been about proof of ownership or origin. Watermarking fake creations works in reverse, all of a sudden what's void of watermarking is true, but those that control the watermarking can either add them to truths to turn them into fakes or skip watermarking for certain people or organizations, making their fake creations become truths.
I've toyed with the idea of issuing LTE IMEI-like identity numbers for digital cameras (and a LTE IMSI/SIM-like identity number to identify a paying accountholder who wishes to subscribe to an image-creator attestation service).
Each photograph would attach cryptographically-verifiable metadata attesting to both the identity of the camera and the person who owns it. (Say, m="Camera 123 owned by subscriber 456 created a raw 20MP image with sha 0xdeadbeef... at time 2026-01-23 4:56pm" countersigned by both the device and subscriber keys).
Image compression would be an immediate issue. Key lifetime management would be another major issue, as would key revocation behavior. Device manufacturers would take time to buy in and phase in hardware support. Consumers would object to yet another subscription service. Privacy and freedom-of-the-press advocates would probably have something to say about establishing a norm where we doubt the legitimacy of any digital images that refuse to "out" their creator.
And other than those pesky little non-starters, I've yet to find anything wrong with it :'-)
(see also: Schneier's Law)
Is this the fastest Google has killed one of its own products (features)?
Even the Microsoft Kin lasted 48 days (I thought it had been cancelled on launch day, but digging back it was just the tech press saying "This was a mistake from Day One" which is certainly true, but not the same thing :-)
Tay lasted 16 hours. Depending on how long Nano banana was live here (unclear from the article) it might have been shorter.
When they talk about everybody losing their jobs, that doesn’t bother them one bit. In fact, they seem to be truly happy when they talk about that. But this, Oh No!
Why does Google Earth need anything remotely related to AI image gen?
A Product Manager in some AI-adjacent department needs a promotion.
"Google career progression: shipped a feature this quarter [x]"...
Ah, box-ticking your way to oblivion...
It doesn't. Whoever is above the Nano Banana 2 team at Google is pushing some agenda that forcibly integrates their AI slop image generator into other teams' products.
Related earlier:
Google Earth's New AI Lets Anyone Fabricate Satellite Images
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49124898