I usually have a strict rule about not participating in reader spaces, because I don’t believe it is my place as an author. Readers should have a safe space to talk about the books they’ve read without feeling as though the author is monitoring their conversations.
However, I’m making this one exception to thank you for bringing this to my attention. I did hire an artist on Fiverr, but unfortunately, as you pointed out, he used AI. This was in the early days of AI, so I wasn’t able to spot it, and surprisingly, no one else pointed it out except you.
I’ve now commissioned a new cover from a real artist whom I trust, who also has a public portfolio and a public stance against AI, which I share as an artist myself.
I will be making a YouTube video about this, where I show evidence that I tried to support real artists but got scammed. This will probably be sometime in August or September, because I want to do the cover reveal in the video to support the real artist.
Again, I apologize for coming into your space uninvited, and thank you so much for letting me know so I can set this right.
As we Egyptians say, I wish you a thousand years of life, prosperity, and health. :)
I usually have a strict rule about not participating in reader spaces, because I don’t believe it is my place as an author. Readers should have a safe space to talk about the books they’ve read without feeling as though the author is monitoring their conversations.
However, I’m making this one exception to thank you for bringing this to my attention. I did hire an artist on Fiverr, but unfortunately, as you pointed out, he used AI. This was in the early days of AI, so I wasn’t able to spot it, and surprisingly, no one else pointed it out except you.
I’ve now commissioned a new cover from a real artist whom I trust, who also has a public portfolio and a public stance against AI, which I share as an artist myself.
I will be making a YouTube video about this, where I show evidence that I tried to support real artists but got scammed. This will probably be sometime in August or September, because I want to do the cover reveal in the video to support the real artist.
Again, I apologize for coming into your space uninvited, and thank you so much for letting me know so I can set this right.
As we Egyptians say, I wish you a thousand years of life, prosperity, and health. :)
Amr Saleh