As AI generation has taken over a real chunk of my output, I've had to draw some actual lines about what I will and won't deliver as generated content, and those lines have gotten clearer the more requests I field. This isn't a broad philosophical stance on AI. It's a practical list built from specific requests that made me uncomfortable enough to say no.
Real people get a real camera
Any request involving a recognizable real person, a spokesperson, an employee, a public figure, stays off-limits for generated video or images unless that person has explicitly consented to an AI likeness being used, in writing, for that specific project. I've turned down requests to "just generate a version of our founder talking" when the founder hadn't actually agreed to it. It doesn't matter how convincing the tool has gotten. Consent isn't a technical problem I can solve with a better model.
Testimonials and reviews, full stop, never
I won't generate content designed to look like a genuine customer testimonial or review. That's not a gray area for me, it's a bright line, because the entire value of a testimonial is that a real person actually said it, and generating a fake one isn't a shortcut, it's fabricating evidence. I've lost a small amount of work over this specific line and I don't regret any of it.
- No generated likeness of a real person without explicit, specific consent
- No fabricated testimonials, reviews, or "customer" content, ever
- Anything presented as authentic documentation of a real event gets a real camera
Where the line actually gets fuzzy
The genuinely hard cases are things like AI-generated environments for a real product shot with real photography, composited together, where the final image is honest about being a composite but a casual viewer might not clock it as partly synthetic. I've started defaulting to disclosure in captions on that kind of work even when clients don't ask for it, because the trust cost of getting caught not disclosing is much higher than the mild awkwardness of just saying so upfront.