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Businesses with ugly AI menu redesigns

blog.fiddery.com

121–130 of 322 posts

Re: Businesses with ugly AI menu redesigns

#121
post #40

I'm starting to see more and more generated images of food at restaurants where I live, but I'm happy to say that its still somewhat rare. My partner and I usually just give a one star review each on Google when we pass by a place like this and then carry on.

Just so I have this clear, you rate a restaurant badly based on the pictures of the food and not the taste/flavor/etc? These places are doing their best to compete in a cutthroat environment with often razor-thin margins but you are willing to write them off and actively try to harm them for reaching for a tool to try and meet consumer's ever-increasing expectations? Just like in the native vs electron debate it's no…

> but you are willing to write them off and actively try to harm them for reaching for a tool to try and meet consumer's ever-increasing expectations?

Emotional blackmailing aside, does the consumer ever expect fake images of the food they purchase in the menu?

Re: Businesses with ugly AI menu redesigns

#122
post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How many of the people who answer polls like that also have the ability to look at a poster and instantly clock that it was AI-generated?

Almost none, sadly. Most of the population just doesn't have that skill, which is why places like Facebook are just reams of AI Jesus upvoted to the Moon. I saw this menu online the other day, and it's not even discernable from the photo what the food products are; it even sets off trypophobia: https://imgur.com/a/YvyRjts But people are still ordering it.

I suspect it is a fair representation of the food you would receive - looks kinda like real food, but actually isn't.

Re: Businesses with ugly AI menu redesigns

#123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think that's AI. It looks more like crappy photoshop.

Not even photoshop. Literal cut and paste of physical photos :D

As a digital native, I was shocked to learn that Photoshop's dodge and burn tools were based on real physical techniques for photo development!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dodging_and_burning

Re: Businesses with ugly AI menu redesigns

#124
post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also why do they have sea life in it at all, surely that's not something that's meant to be in the pool.

This helped my nostalgic craving for those pedantic old school HN comments which I seem to see less of nowadays...But frankly as a kid playing in the pool often revolved around pretending to be some kind of sea creature.

Reminds me of the scene in The Social Network (2010) where Mark Zuckerberg points out the absurdity of playing a looping video of the Niagara falls in the background during a Caribbean themed party: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N9R8uYUXLUc

Re: Businesses with ugly AI menu redesigns

#125
post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How many of the people who answer polls like that also have the ability to look at a poster and instantly clock that it was AI-generated?

What's the argument here? People don't like spit in their food, how many people can tell their food got spat in? Does that mean they're somehow wrong or to be belittled for not liking spit in their food?

It's not an argument, it's an open question: do people who express a dislike of AI know when they see a poster that was generated with assistance from AI?

Re: Businesses with ugly AI menu redesigns

#127
post #30

I'm fascinated by how AI poster designs have taken over local advertising in seemingly just the last six months - presumably because ChatGPT Images and Gemini Nano Banana finally got good enough at outputting text without obvious defects in the typography. The posters all look good - much better than their desktop publishing predecessors. And yet they also eat away at the credibility of the event or business for me.…

Not just you. There's been a huge pushback in the local music community around this. Concerts listings now prominently feature the name of the poster designer! Humans FTW.

Finally! We need more of this. It did happen sometimes in the past, but not nearly as often as it should.

Re: Businesses with ugly AI menu redesigns

#128
post #49
post #30

I'm fascinated by how AI poster designs have taken over local advertising in seemingly just the last six months - presumably because ChatGPT Images and Gemini Nano Banana finally got good enough at outputting text without obvious defects in the typography. The posters all look good - much better than their desktop publishing predecessors. And yet they also eat away at the credibility of the event or business for me.…

> how AI poster designs have taken over local advertising Tale as old as time: a race to the bottom. Businesses trying to cut corners, thinking they can offset it against losses from exiting customers. If it wasn't, a lot will just cut more corners.

[dead]

Re: Businesses with ugly AI menu redesigns

#129

I get the consumers' ick when I see an AI-generated menu, logo, or sign as much as the next person. Beyond that, there is an argument to be made about the discrepancy between the pictorial depictions of a food item and what you are actually served in real life. I wish something akin to Japan's strict food packaging laws existed for restaurants.

I have a few friends I’d describe as high up in the restaurant industry. They’ll usually be skeptical of a menu with photos unless it’s a mom and pop place that’s been around for decades. There’s a big reason more expensive restaurants don’t have pictures on their menus, even when they’re the best equipped to ensure your meal matches the picture.

Gordon Ramsay in many of his kitchen nightmare episodes says it's always a bad sign whenever a restaurant has photos on their menu.

Re: Businesses with ugly AI menu redesigns

#130
post #30

I'm fascinated by how AI poster designs have taken over local advertising in seemingly just the last six months - presumably because ChatGPT Images and Gemini Nano Banana finally got good enough at outputting text without obvious defects in the typography. The posters all look good - much better than their desktop publishing predecessors. And yet they also eat away at the credibility of the event or business for me.…

Not just you. There's been a huge pushback in the local music community around this. Concerts listings now prominently feature the name of the poster designer! Humans FTW.

One of the coolest things about seeing a show at the Fillmore is getting the posters they hand out. A number of bands sell, or have their artists, sell show posters (which then become collectible limited editions); it's way less offensive when it's King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard than when it's Wizards of the Coast.
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