05/17/2026
Hello my friends and clients of Deaton Signs. This is a public service announcement regarding AI. I have been designing and building and installing signwork for roughly 45 years. In all those years, I took the information that customers gave me, designed work that fit them and their business and then made their sign specifically for them. No cookie cutter crap. No using the same design over for anything. Lately, more and more people have been sending me "art" to use for whatever type sign they are wanting. They go to chatgpt or some other AI site, type in a few prompts, out pops artwork that they "designed". They want to use the aforementioned "art" on their sign or cards or vehicles, etc. I didn't get in this business and work on it for 45 years to end up being a signmaker that just ends up just being a printer. Push aside all the design skills I have learned over the years, designs that were featured on the cover of Signcraft magazine twice and many times in side the magazine and just take what customers give me to have printed out and stuck on metal or windows or vehicles, etc. Usually when people came to me, they came because they liked something I did, something I did without AI or any help and wanted me to design something specifically for them. Seems like more and more customers want to bring you a design that came from a program that takes millions of pieces of art from the net and uses it to create. So none of it is original. It only takes minutes and it uses other peoples art to "design" whatever you feed into it. I have made a decision to not accept any AI from customers to create their sign anymore. I have skills that I have refined over the years and would rather go out of business than become who just prints and sticks whatever someone brings me. If you have AI "art" you want made into a sign, I advise you to take it somewhere else and get it done. I would rather go to work at Wal-Mart than be a flunky to AI crap. Thank you for sticking with me all these years and allowing me to use my skills to create something just for you. I have invested many hours and years and money for fonts and programs that allow me to design what I see in my head. AI is destroying the careers of artists who actually create from their minds and their hands and seemingly no one cares that it is happening to us. And that's a shame. This is for all my artist friends and sign maker friends who worry they may be getting phased out. Stand up and stand firm.
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