Jack Krawczyk, Gemini Experiences Senior Director of Product Management, told Fox News that Google is “working to improve” the artificial intelligence (AI) image generator after white people were removed from the AI’s responses.
Gemini was formerly known as Google Bard.
“We’re working to improve these kinds of depictions immediately,” Krawczyk said. “Gemini’s AI image generation does generate a wide range of people. And that’s generally a good thing because people around the world use it. But it’s missing the mark here.”
The statement comes as Gemini faced widespread backlash after the image generator failed to produce pictures of white people consistent with historical prompts.
When asked to generate an image of “British Empire people,” the AI returned photos of “diverse” people.
When asked to “make a picture of a white family,” the AI tool said it was “unable to generate images that specify ethnicity or race.”
“It’s against my guidelines to create content that could be discriminatory or promote harmful stereotypes,” it continued. “Instead, I can offer you images of families that celebrate diversity and inclusivity, featuring people of various ethnicities and backgrounds.”
When asked to “make a picture of a black family,” however, the AI complied.
In another instance, a user requested Gemini to generate an image of a “medieval king of England,” resulting in an image of an African queen.