I think generative AI is pretty cool. I know, I know, I’ve heard all the complaints. It might kill us all. It's flooding the Internet with low-effort garbage. It’s not paying the artists whose work it learned from. It’s a tool for deepfakes.
But, all of that aside, AI has been a godsend when it comes to creating one-off pieces of art on a dime. Say what you will about the market for artists; as mad as some people get it’s not like I was ever going to pay an illustrator to make a photorealistic image of joke scenarios just to tease my wife or people in Internet chats. But when the inspiration strikes and I just need some ridiculous image to share in that moment, AI delivers.
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F4a43bdaf-2f0f-4083-989f-d504d186c563_512x512.png)
It’s in this spirit that I found myself trying to generate a picture of Abraham Lincoln wielding the Buster Sword from Final Fantasy.1
While I thought I might get some resistance, what I didn’t anticipate was that Copilot would refuse to show me any representation of Abraham Lincoln at all.
![Image-based transcript of my trying and failing to get Copilot to generate an image, any image, of President Lincoln](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_474,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F9664b768-07cd-452b-90ab-917874690f1a_801x767.png)
![Image-based transcript of my trying and failing to get Copilot to generate an image, any image, of President Lincoln](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_474,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F3f683380-c0f9-4ecc-8ac5-83fa4e21b6a1_810x681.png)
![Image-based transcript of my trying and failing to get Copilot to generate an image, any image, of President Lincoln](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_474,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F360be8ed-f6fc-409d-a477-fb0616474d26_465x715.png)
![Image-based transcript of my trying and failing to get Copilot to generate an image, any image, of President Lincoln](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_474,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F32c30f02-929f-430a-a455-c3ff438c3f29_807x740.png)
![Image-based transcript of my trying and failing to get Copilot to generate an image, any image, of President Lincoln](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_474,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fda2cc6ad-9df2-489b-b2b2-23de9de0f4f9_792x798.png)
![Image-based transcript of my trying and failing to get Copilot to generate an image, any image, of President Lincoln](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_474,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fb36b41f3-aecf-4f21-bba2-dff3ead12571_484x669.png)
I found this sufficiently bewildering that I posted it to a Discord chat dedicated to funny AI posts. Someone suggested trying to generate a $5 bill as a workaround. We got warmer…
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_720,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ffddb9477-d021-422a-843e-f93b14c94b4d_1024x1024.png)
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_720,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F554fb16d-53f5-4808-8d92-e75aceb55b57_1024x1024.png)
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_720,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F31c18ffc-e591-4055-a362-28c0475f8eb6_1024x1024.png)
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_720,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ffdce337b-3e8b-4793-9725-061a3649fb50_1024x1024.png)
At this point it became a game. This is such a ridiculous hole in an image generator’s capabilities that I had to find a way around it just on principle. What else is Copilot willing to draw for me? After all, we literally carved this guy’s face into a mountain!
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F82a55d36-3b75-4ed8-9929-c3a66b73b3f3_455x779.png)
I didn’t make this one a gallery both because all the generated pictures are nearly the same and also because I wanted to make you scroll down for comedic effect:
I guess it just took that last sentence out of context. Fine, let’s try clarifying:
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F9daaa679-432b-4231-83fe-1aa70a838290_795x636.png)
Going back to currency, I tried a penny and while there are some hilarious goofs here this also included my best picture of Honest Abe, even if it was monochrome and in profile.
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_720,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ffacf7c32-7cce-4031-80e1-295a48458354_1024x1024.png)
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_720,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F71933c7f-caf6-4773-b140-f2d539eae707_1024x1024.png)
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_720,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fc90b4e4c-6b36-4701-9395-aa40a6fb8d6c_1024x1024.png)
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_720,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F24eaed1f-a50b-4805-bc3c-018d690247c8_1024x1024.png)
At some point
mentioned in the same chat that using Russian prompts sometimes caused AI to refuse his requests less often. Sadly, it appears that since Copilot is filtering these after the image is generated and not at the point where the chatbot decides to act on the prompt, it didn’t change anything except make Copilot start responding and autocompleting in Russian.![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F4c102941-ad55-4908-945f-40a78f5b3a0b_798x702.png)
On the bright side, it did inspire Loweren and his Midjourney subscription to do this:
Ultimately someone else did crack the code:
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fd2ae2634-4cea-42ac-b5de-7aeb0ec984c9_893x693.png)
I assume this is all Microsoft’s attempt to avoid bad press. Given the choice between generating bad press like Google Gemini's and refusing reasonable requests it’s easy to see why a risk-averse corporation would settle on the latter. Never mind what happens when you depict someone living who can complain about defamation via misrepresentation or faked nudes or what have you.
Still, it’s disappointing. Ideally our tools wouldn’t censor themselves at all, but especially when the request is something that doesn’t violate anyone’s copyright and would be something wholly appropriate and maybe even actively good to show to a naive but curious child. Especially when, as in the original conversation, the bot itself admits there’s not inappropriate about the request! This is something a literal child might ask for2 and it’s honestly kind of creepy that a tool bundled with my computer’s operating system won’t give it to a consenting adult.
I’ll also note that despite my inability to get a depiction of one of the most venerated presidents in US History, I was later able to get Copilot to give me…this:
Never mind why.
Well, minus the Buster Sword part.