Unity Software (NYSE: U) launched the beta of Unity Muse and Unity Sentis, which are A.I. platforms for content and game development. However, fans and creators are questioning the datasets these platforms are using.
2023 is becoming the year Artificial Intelligence (A.I.) is being heavily marketed and leveraged across different industries. However, A.I. is also on the receiving end of increasingly close scrutiny, due to issues of unethical and potentially illegal use of proprietary data without consent from their authors, nor proper compensation. Which is why some fans, artists, and game creators are voicing their queries on what datasets the new Unity AI platforms will be trained on.
The launch of Unity Muse and Unity Sentis was announced via Unity’s official blog and shared on social media.
Imagine more with Unity AI 🔮 Introducing:
⭐ #UnityMuse, a platform of AI capabilities for content creation, with Muse Chat for AI-based search now in closed beta
⭐ #UnitySentis for AI-powered experiences at Unity runtime, now in closed betaLearn more: https://t.co/PThr4Ju0d4 pic.twitter.com/ggVqJKaEVF
— Unity for Games (@unitygames) June 27, 2023
Touted as “AI-powered creativity”, Unity Create SVP and General Manager Marc Whitten describes the new AI products as follows:
We’re harnessing the power of AI to drive innovation, accelerate content creation, and increase your productivity across games, entertainment, and industrial use cases. We’ve been building a suite of AI tools that promise to accelerate creation time and complement your workflows by finding information and generating draft assets as quickly as typing in a text prompt or scribbling a sketch. From there, you could integrate work with familiar tooling to revise and edit the assets you need at a speed that’s unimaginable with today’s workflows.
Today we’re announcing two new AI products: Unity Muse, an expansive platform for AI-driven assistance during creation, and Unity Sentis, which allows you to embed neural networks in your builds to enable previously unimaginable real-time experiences.
Unity Muse is further defined as a platform to accelerate the creation of real real-time 3D applications and video games. The platform will be closely connected to the Unity Editor, enabling text prompts and sketches, rather than traditional manual coding which can be more time-consuming.
Meanwhile, Unity Sentis is intended to function with the Unity Runtime of apps and games built with Unity. Specifically, it will embed an AI model to enhance the speed and functionality. Unity Sentis will apparently work on various platforms that can run Unity, from Windows PC and browsers to consoles like the current generation Sony Playstation and Nintendo Switch.
Aside from Unity’s newly launched Unity Muse and Unity Sentis, Unity will begin offering expanded A.I. solutions on theirUnity Asset Store from third-party providers such as Atlas, Convai, Inworld AI, Layer AI, Leonardo Ai, LMNT, Modl.ai, Polyhive, Replica Studios, and Zibra AI. These providers offer assets that assist with VFX, 2D sprites, 3D polygonal models, generative, speech, textures, and other elements that creators using Unity may be interested in.
Ok but what data did you train all this on? If you ask it to make sprites in the style of Loish, will it do it?
— Mulm, renewable bad energy (@mulmbot) June 27, 2023
But it seems there are Unity fans, artists, and game creators that are very concerned about this development. The main question people are raising on social media such as Twitter in light of the Unity AI announcement is what datasets Unity Muse and Unity Sentis are trained on. Most artificial intelligence apps such as ChatGPT, Midjourney, Stability AI, and more are currently incorporating allegedly unethical datasets which are the subject of multiple ongoing lawsuits.
Which datasets were used in development of this? Did you negotiate & acquire all relevant licenses directly from copyright holders?
— Katria (@katriaraden) June 27, 2023
The timing for Unity joining in on the current A.I. bandwagon seems ill-advised. The U.S. and EU are in the midst of defining laws to more specifically regulate the technology and datasets being used. AI-centric companies and their figureheads such as OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Stability AI CEO Emad Mostaque are in the crosshairs of these A.I. regulation discussions.
Gaming companies have also been criticized for their use of A.I. In the past few months, Blizzard, Ubisoft, Bungie, and more have had their fair share of backlash from fans and creatives such as artists and writers due to different circumstances involving the use of A.I. in their games, marketing, and business processes.
Plus, one of the main issues the current Writers Guild of America strike centers on the use of A.I. in the film and television industry. Aside from potentially taking away work from people, the WGA is concerned about the proprietary rights being unjustly used as part of training data for A.I. And there is also the fact that A.I. generated content without sufficien human authorship is effectively public domain, according to the U.S. Copyright Office and the Federal Trade Commission.
Thus, far, the only response to the queries regarding the datasets Unity Muse and Unity Sentis is a vague confirmation of licensing third-party LLMs (Large Language Models) into the Muse Chat. However, this does not directly address the question fans, artists, and creators are asking regarding the source of the datasets.
We appreciate all the questions and interest around our training data. To create Muse Chat, we licensed third party LLMs and integrated them with first-party Unity technical documentation like manuals, release notes etc. so you can get the most relevant and up-to-date info.
— Unity for Games (@unitygames) June 27, 2023
With Unity joining the list of high-profile companies fully embracing A.I. into their business model, which company will be next in line? Are the concerns being raised regarding the datasets Unity Muse and Unity Sentis are trained on just the beginning?
For interested parties wanting to check out these Unity AI, they can apply to the Unity AI Beta Program.
