Google examines using AI images on web pages.
In the most recent Search off the Record podcast hosted by Google, Lizzi Sassman and John Mueller discussed using AI-generated images on web pages.
A few of their views might seem odd given how AI-produced Google handles text content.
John Mueller highlighted inherent limitations in the AI image generator technology.
Automatically Generating Content
Automatically produced text content is not permitted for Google search, but only in the scope of its use to alter the results of a search.
Google's guidelines for auto-generated material say:
“In situations where it’s designed to alter search rankings and does not benefit the users in any way, Google may take actions regarding the content.”
Google’s John Mueller is also on record as saying that AI-generated text is considered to be spam:
“For us, these would fall under the category of automatically generated content that we’ve been able to define since the Webmaster Guidelines almost the beginning.
My thought is that maybe the quality of the content may be slightly better than the more traditional tools; however, for us, it’s still a purely automated process, and to us that it’s still in violation of what is referred to as the Webmaster Guidelines. Therefore, we consider it spam.
…But we will be able to take action if we notice that something is generated automatically by the webspam team, then we will be able to take action about the issue.”
Perhaps as an indication of the rapid pace of technological advancement, there are gray zones in Google’s restrictions regarding auto-gen content.
For example, the use of automated text translation to create content is not in line with the guidelines, except when a person reviews and edits the content.
In the guideline above mentioned on autogenerated content auto-translated content is not allowed by the following sentence:
“An automated program translated text without human oversight or curation before publication.”
Google also permits automatically creating Meta descriptions that are automatically generated since meta descriptions aren’t utilized for ranking purposes.
“For large databases-driven websites such as product aggregators, handwritten descriptions are difficult. …programmatic generation of descriptions may be suitable and is advised.”
Also, Google doesn’t ban AI content in all cases, only in specific situations.
AI-Generated Images
Since AI-generated content could be able to rank on Google Images, one would be inclined to believe it is likely that AI-created images are not allowed.
However, that’s not the situation.
Lizzi Sassman and John Mueller discussed using AI-generated content on Google hypothetically and were pretty happy with it.
The following was how they told them :
“Lizzi Sassman: Hey! To kick off the discussion, I’m sure you’ve done quite a bit with DALL-E on the Crayon website and many other places to find fun pictures.
I was thinking about what you would think of using DALL-E to create images for our website, Google Search Central if we were to pipe the data for a refresh of our pictures across our entire site. What do you think?
John Mueller: That would be an exciting thing to do.”
The only place Mueller isn’t convinced concerning the use of AI to create images is when it depicts something that is supposed to be real, for example, the screenshot.
Mueller continued:
“I think the tricky part would be if you’re showing screenshots of specific things, and you’re piping that into some machine-art-generated something, then maybe you don’t necessarily get actual screenshots.
Lizzi Sassman: This could take a new direction. So it seems like you’re invested. Do you think you’d do this?
John Mueller: I would test it. I’m talking about…
Lizzi Sassman: Do you want to say no?
John Mueller: I’m not going to say “no.”
I don’t know what it’s going to appear like. It could be fantastic. Maybe on Halloween, we can make that happen.”
Caps AI Generated Content
The only issue John Mueller had about AI images was that the technology is based on data from images; therefore, the ability to produce a photo is restricted to what’s in the image library that it was trained from.
Lizzi as well as John kept their conversation going:
“I think one of the most challenging position for all these tools is that they build on a well-known collection of images.
If there aren’t enough images, Then whatever you want to ask can be very vague.
I’ve tried many SEO terms once, and almost all the time, when it realized that this was marketing SEO, it would show me an image of, for instance, bars with a line graph drawing up and saying, “This is SEO.”
It’s similar to, “Well, it’s kind of like… It’s …”
Lizzi Sassman: It’s just like your view, man.
John Mueller: Yeah. Exactly.”
Are AI Images currently working?
It is okay to use AI images on websites is allowed.
While autogenerated text content is banned or limited to rank within Google Search, surprisingly, there was no similar restriction or caveat outlined about AI-generated images or ranking on Google Images.
