Judging by the team stance and recent "incident", I'd propose adding this sentence under General / Rules

Here's all versions, this thing went through so far

->
->
->

as second sentences, I was tossing around either

1. You cannot claim ownership of work that is not yours.
2. leaving it empty

If anyone has something to add as a second sentence, feel free to drop ideas.

I also am not 100% sure on "is AI generating placement and then changing it fine". My gut stance says probably not. Don't know if that's worth clarifying?

as a sidenote that i found incredibly amusing:

funnily, currently, if you ai-generate most of your beatmap it is unrankable by default because as the host you must have mapped the majority of the set so the AI-Model would need to be the host which is impossible

sure, there's ways to work around that, but yeah

I agree with this for the most part, but I feel like it’s a pretty bland description as to what is considered an unrankable AI map. For example, is even placing 1 hit object with AI unrankable? Are AI assisted tools as such to help map directly disallowed (if they exist)? To prevent loopholing, I think it should be a little more clear on completely disallowing AI within beatmaps such as adding “AI-Generation, AI-Assisted, or other related generation must not be used to create any hit objects within a beatmap.”

AI mappers, artists etc should be banned

chidodou wrote:

I agree with this for the most part, but I feel like it’s a pretty bland description as to what is considered an unrankable AI map. For example, is even placing 1 hit object with AI unrankable? Are AI assisted tools such as the overlay tools to help map directly disallowed?

I yoinked the way the Ai-generated media disclosure in the RC is currently worded, that's why it probably is kinda vague. I think your suggestion is fine, updated

I think ```You cannot claim ownership of work that is not yours.``` being included is a no-brainer.

As for the other clause you can put it in, but my question is, how enforceable is it? cause regardless if we were to put it in and some blokes decide to evade it, well, won't that be useless?

SupaV wrote:

I think ```You cannot claim ownership of work that is not yours.``` being included is a no-brainer.

As for the other clause you can put it in, but my question is, how enforceable is it? cause regardless if we were to put it in and some blokes decide to evade it, well, won't that be useless?

I think it's less about how enforcable it is, most of the RC is enforced on a report basis, something makes it to qualified, a concern is reported and action is taken, in this case we took action without strictly having RC against it and used other general rules to bridge the gap.

Agree with the proposal and agree that adding the second sentence would be beneficial. That by itself could technically be a rule of its own if we consider ghost mapping is a thing. But having it under that rule would make both enforceable.

For a second sentence, I would propose If you generate a beatmap with AI, it's done the creative work of deciding how to place the hit objects, and not you. This concisely explains the stance of the team on AI-generated maps, and why AI-generated maps are considered problematic. Remember, some people, especially those not in the osu! community, may consider AI equal to something they had created themselves.

re: chidodou's phrasing: It would be more grammatically correct to phrase that "AI generation, AI assistance, or other related generation methods[...]" since "AI" and "generation" are separate words.

While I agree with this, and this could be another discussion, I'm just curious how one can identify whether something is AI-generated VS what is not. How easy is it to determine that something was generated without the mapper saying that it was?

Aurele wrote:

I'm just curious how one can identify whether something is AI-generated VS what is not

Again the point of the proposal isn't how easy it'd be to enforce. As we have seen, it can be. We just need a concise rule against it as the game does not support this kind of thing. Just like cheaters and other hidden foul play is dealt with.

whats the incident?

mapper just has to say its not AI, cuz u have no way to prove it... so useless

and suppose theres a AI tool which gives u modding like a normal modder, and u apply some of the mods cuz it improves ur map. now ur map is considered unrankable??? this makes no sense to me, cuz ultimately u are the one to decide to aplly mod or not

with same logic u should also not rank any map from newbie mapper who blindly apllies all BN mod without thinking

also just curious how do u treat the maps created by my program automap-chan? mapper will probably adjust the pattern, but if they dont for some notes, because theres no need to change it

what about AI generated HS?

niat0004 wrote:

For a second sentence, I would propose If you generate a beatmap with AI, it's done the creative work of deciding how to place the hit objects, and not you. This concisely explains the stance of the team on AI-generated maps.

I think an update to the rule that already exists should be better so that it kinda serves as a reminder that a map isn’t yours if you generate it to prevent redundancy, such as adding to the rule “You cannot claim ownership of work that is not yours. This includes “ghost mapping”, or any type of artificial generation, such as AI generation or AI assistive tools used to create any objects within a beatmap.”

Drum-Hitnormal wrote:

and suppose there's an AI tool which gives u modding like a normal modder, and u apply some of the mods cuz it improves ur map. now ur map is considered unrankable??? this makes no sense to me, cuz ultimately u are the one to decide to apply mod or not

I agree with you, but the AI didn't "create hit objects" in this case. It gave you a suggestion on how to place them, which doesn't count as creating objects directly.

chidodou wrote:

I think an update to the rule that already exists should be better so that it kinda serves as a reminder that a map isn’t yours if you generate it to prevent redundancy, such as adding to the rule “You cannot claim ownership of work that is not yours. This includes “ghost mapping”, or any type of artificial generation, such as AI generation or AI assistive tools used to create any objects within a beatmap.”

I agree with this proposal. I just think it should be made clear to people why AI generation isn't your own original work.

Can we extend this to hitsounds too? Mapperinatorinator has a hitsounds generator and the lack of mention implies that being acceptable

1000000% agree on this proposal.

And agree with what Nyanaro said about it extending to HS.
Actually, let's forbid any kind of generative AI usage in ranked, period.

From what I know there are ways to know if a map has been AI generated, as I've asked OliBomby themselves.

+ We already know peppy himself does not support AI generated maps

To play devil's advocate, I think using generative AI for the initial drafts of a map is fine. In many cases, maps I make exist to provide *a* map of a song I want to play. While I could spend 5 hours making my own version, I could generate a map based on my style in 15 minutes, spend a further 30 minutes tweaking anything out of place, and have a completed set to play in under an hour. It just saves a lot of time in creating content.

I also think that this is a strange restriction to put in place given the inexorable tendency towards ranking anything nowadays. I would seriously argue that many modern maps that are 'genetically engineered' for pp and comfort purposes are similarly devoid of creative effort and are completely disconnected from the song to a much greater extent than AI maps.

Finally I would like to point out that it's not that plausible to enforce this rule, especially on low difficulties, which should be a factor in consideration. We all can see how well the "include BG in description" rule is followed for example.

Therefore, I think that, at minimum, AI lower difficulties should be allowed. And I think that if a map is AI generated and subsequently edited by the mapper to a rankable state, that should be allowed as well.

ai generated storyboards are bound to be made eventually as well, so should account for that too

Nao Tomori wrote:

To play devil's advocate, I think using generative AI for the initial drafts of a map is fine. In many cases, maps I make exist to provide *a* map of a song I want to play. While I could spend 5 hours making my own version, I could generate a map based on my style in 15 minutes, spend a further 30 minutes tweaking anything out of place, and have a completed set to play in under an hour. It just saves a lot of time in creating content.

ok but if your intent is having *a* map of the song that you want to play, then why are you ranking it? ranking it is clearly pushing it to others, so if it's just for you, there is no point in ranking it.

Nao Tomori wrote:

To play devil's advocate, I think using generative AI for the initial drafts of a map is fine. In many cases, maps I make exist to provide *a* map of a song I want to play. While I could spend 5 hours making my own version, I could generate a map based on my style in 15 minutes, spend a further 30 minutes tweaking anything out of place, and have a completed set to play in under an hour. It just saves a lot of time in creating content.

I also think that this is a strange restriction to put in place given the inexorable tendency towards ranking anything nowadays. I would seriously argue that many modern maps that are 'genetically engineered' for pp and comfort purposes are similarly devoid of creative effort and are completely disconnected from the song to a much greater extent than AI maps.

Finally I would like to point out that it's not that plausible to enforce this rule, especially on low difficulties, which should be a factor in consideration. We all can see how well the "include BG in description" rule is followed for example.

Therefore, I think that, at minimum, AI lower difficulties should be allowed. And I think that if a map is AI generated and subsequently edited by the mapper to a rankable state, that should be allowed as well.

agree with u, AI is the future in all industry... as long mapper owns the final product, and its decent quality then it is fine. the process doesnt matter

Nao Tomori wrote:

To play devil's advocate, I think using generative AI for the initial drafts of a map is fine. In many cases, maps I make exist to provide *a* map of a song I want to play. While I could spend 5 hours making my own version, I could generate a map based on my style in 15 minutes, spend a further 30 minutes tweaking anything out of place, and have a completed set to play in under an hour. It just saves a lot of time in creating content.

I also think that this is a strange restriction to put in place given the inexorable tendency towards ranking anything nowadays. I would seriously argue that many modern maps that are 'genetically engineered' for pp and comfort purposes are similarly devoid of creative effort and are completely disconnected from the song to a much greater extent than AI maps.

Finally I would like to point out that it's not that plausible to enforce this rule, especially on low difficulties, which should be a factor in consideration. We all can see how well the "include BG in description" rule is followed for example.

Therefore, I think that, at minimum, AI lower difficulties should be allowed. And I think that if a map is AI generated and subsequently edited by the mapper to a rankable state, that should be allowed as well.

I'm neutral regarding AI map drafts, since those can help you get an idea of how you want to map, but they may stop you from considering as many clever options when mapping.

However, I'm very much against AI generation of low difficulties, since you can be creative in low difficulties, and it's a bit disrespectful to beginners to say “we don't think you deserve a map made by hand”, even if that's not the point you're trying to make.

the process doesnt matter

Feel like this thought process undermines a lot of attention to detail and effort that many mappers put into their maps.
Mapping isn't about ranking a map by any means necessary, it's about people putting their own creativity, their own personality and ways of creating a rhythm game level around a song they like.

Same goes for any type of design, art, creation.
The human factor is important and shouldn't so easily be brushed aside.

Process does in fact matter a lot.

100% agree with what niat0004 wrote about AI generating low difficulties, first off they don't even take much time to create, only reason one would have for doing this is laziness I feel like.

Not to mention how much low difficulties matter in terms of getting new people into osu... really bad idea to make them effortless and uninspired...

I think if you're ranking a map, you've already decided you're intending to push this to the players, as such you should put in the effort to make an actual map and not just serving them a slightly modified version of what ai generated. if it's for private play, then it's whatever, but if you intend for others to play, which is ranked, then you should actually map it yourself.

Drum-Hitnormal wrote:

the process doesnt matter

The whole point of mapping should be to have fun in the process and be proud of the final product. I do not think this is a stance many people would stand by. Especially on a creative medium...

Stompy_ wrote:

the process doesnt matter

Feel like this thought process undermines a lot of attention to detail and effort that many mappers put into their maps.
Mapping isn't about ranking a map by any means necessary, it's about people putting their own creativity, their own personality and ways of creating a rhythm game level around a song they like.

Same goes for any type of design, art, creation.
The human factor is important and shouldn't so easily be brushed aside.

Process does in fact matter a lot.

100% agree with what niat0004 wrote about AI generating low difficulties, first off they don't even take much time to create, only reason one would have for doing this is laziness I feel like.

as player i just want more content, better content, idc how its made. (Deleted)

if u care so much about process go nom the 100h effort shit map by new mapper instead 1h quick draft which is better quality by experienced mapper

i think we have to be perilously specific here and there's a few ways we can do it, but maybe we should start with something like:

1. Beatmaps must be created exclusively by direct human input without the use of any generative tooling.

one thing we need to tread carefully around is not disqualifying or introducing excessive uncertainty around other kinds of non-AI related tooling that mappers make regular use of. the term 'AI' itself is especially vague and can potentially refer to heuristic stuff like MV, and we clearly don't want to nix the use of that

Drum-Hitnormal wrote:

as player i just want more content, better content, idc how its made. [deleted]

That's not how the thought process of the osu! community has been historically and the now-deleted part reminds me of the “you participate in society therefore you cannot criticise society” fallacy. Also, players will be able to notice differences in maps relatively soon after they start playing, and AI maps will not be considered better content, even to them.

I don't believe it will result in significantly more content; it will result in the content that would have been made anyway being generated with AI and without human thought, limiting the cool things it can do.

Drum-Hitnormal wrote:

as player i just want more content, better content, idc how its made.

"better content" ai will not deliver that as all it will do is copy what already exists.
"more content" there are so many maps being made constantly already, we don't need ai to fill it up even more, you won't ever play all of it as it is anyway.

if you want more content, graveyard section has more than you can ever play in your entire life

@Drum-Hitnormal Please tone it down... The last two sentences were completely avoidable and are straight up inappropriate.

Aspheria wrote:

Drum-Hitnormal wrote:

as player i just want more content, better content, idc how its made.

"better content" ai will not deliver that as all it will do is copy what already exists.
"more content" there are so many maps being made constantly already, we don't need ai to fill it up even more, you won't ever play all of it as it is anyway.

if you want more content, graveyard section has more than you can ever play in your entire life

+1000000000000000000000000000000000

Agree Aspheria

Aspheria wrote:

Drum-Hitnormal wrote:

as player i just want more content, better content, idc how its made.

"better content" ai will not deliver that as all it will do is copy what already exists.
"more content" there are so many maps being made constantly already, we don't need ai to fill it up even more, you won't ever play all of it as it is anyway.

if you want more content, graveyard section has more than you can ever play in your entire life

+2 - graved AI maps aren't being stopped at all by this, but Ranked is meant to be about quality and especially creativity, which AI cannot provide sufficient levels of for the foreseeable future

RC wording notwithstanding, the major existential threat AI/generative mapping poses is the "scooping" of entry and mid-level creators. posit that you're a new mapper dude looking to get started: how likely are you to continue learning a new (and rather difficult) craft when content close to your technical capabilities for the next few months/years can be generated in seconds?

the answer for most people is "not very", which in essence turns the acceptance of generative beatmapping into a Faustian bargain that gets us more mediocre beatmaps now for a significantly contracted and disengaged mapper scene later. in internal discussions it has been described as analogous to cheating software in terms of the disruption and damage it causes to osu! as a community, and while some might consider that classification extreme at a surface level, it really isn't that far off the mark if you think about it

a major problem with allowing ai generated maps is that you're enabling it, which will lead to normalization, and once it's normalized, why even map anymore? why would you spend loads of time and effort to make a map yourself when the system basically encourages you to just use an ai to generate it in a couple minutes?

ai in general is toxic to any creative field as if it's accepted then why even bother doing it anymore? it leads to stagnation, worse products, worse user experience, and the field is just ruined.
I don't think we want this to happen

+1, i agree with what stompy, randome, etc. said for this proposal

Aspheria wrote:

a major problem with allowing ai generated maps is that you're enabling it, which will lead to normalization, and once it's normalized, why even map anymore? why would you spend loads of time and effort to make a map yourself when the system basically encourages you to just use an ai to generate it in a couple minutes?

ai in general is toxic to any creative field as if it's accepted then why even bother doing it anymore? it leads to stagnation, worse products, worse user experience, and the field is just ruined.
I don't think we want this to happen

this implies a different discussion of "is AI fine in Graveyard", in fact, but that's a tangent
+1 eph

on the other hand, I think modding by AI isn't taking creativity away from the mapper, so it should generally be fine IMO - but maybe not, since new modders might be rejected (or have nothing to do more generally) in favour of AI

Ephemeral wrote:

RC wording notwithstanding, the major existential threat AI/generative mapping poses is the "scooping" of entry and mid-level creators. posit that you're a new mapper dude looking to get started: how likely are you to continue learning a new (and rather difficult) craft when content close to your technical capabilities for the next few months/years can be generated in seconds?

the answer for most people is "not very", which in essence turns the acceptance of generative beatmapping into a Faustian bargain that gets us more mediocre beatmaps now for a significantly contracted and disengaged mapper scene later. in internal discussions it has been described as analogous to cheating software in terms of the disruption and damage it causes to osu! as a community, and while some might consider that classification extreme at a surface level, it really isn't that far off the mark if you think about it

Not to purposely write a slippery slope fallacy, however..

Generative AI undermines a lot of the creative process and would only present issues down the line and eventually would lead to osu's decrease in popularity and community engagement over the years.

Would people find some human player achieving some result in osu! or an AI more entertaining and impressive?

To compare it to other media, the human factor is why the overwhelming majority of people watch sports between humans, would you have the same enjoyment of watching 2 chess players play or 2 AIs.

AI will never be able to create something original, the whole process of it is taking what other people have already done and mixing and mashing it into a soup that more often than not, does not make sense.

AI has no place in ranked, and I believe a tool should be made to detect AI involvement.

The human factor does matter.

niat0004 wrote:

this implies a different discussion of "is AI fine in Graveyard", in fact, but that's a tangent

considering how graveyard is, personally I still view any kind of ai mapping as 100% bad, but I also see you can't do anything about it, so if we have to deal with ai maps, I'd rather they go to graveyard than to ranked

Stompy_ wrote:

would you have the same enjoyment of watching 2 chess players play or 2 AIs.

I see the example, but I just wanna mention that chess might not be the best medium for it as 2 AIs, like Stockfish vs Leela can be genuinely fascinating to watch. and then having like chatgpt vs some other chat ai is just funny. but for actual competitive chess, then yes, I watch for Magnus, I wouldn't watch the chess world championship without him

Agree with the proposal and I would like to provide an additional argument that seemingly no one has mentioned yet:

Allowing AI-generated maps, no matter to which extent, will make the relationship built through mapping more fragile. You'll no longer know if this promising mapper that you really like has been actually secretly using AI, you'll no longer know if your favorite mapper's latest update was completely AI-generated, and you'll no longer know if this efficient, prolific cool low-diff mapping folk has in fact been benefiting from AI since who knows when. This would especially be true for players, who, as far as I've seen, can't really tell the difference between AI-generated maps and human-making maps. I am an AI believer and I believe AI mapping can be used in a lot of positive ways (such as low diff mapping as Nao said, or providing users a quick draft on songs they love but no one has mapped), but judging from the recent incident, it is clear that not everyone will be honestly crediting the AI usage, and I personally would hate to see this happen especially on long-time relationships, which largely outweighs my belief in the potential of AI in mapping per se.

E: These being said, I think AI-assisted timing should be allowed, as it is indeed painful and doesn't include any creative processes. That is the only place where I think AI can actually help in mapping without doing any kinds of harm.

Ryuusei Aika wrote:

Agree with the proposal and I would like to provide an additional argument that seemingly no one has mentioned yet:

Allowing AI-generated maps, no matter to which extent, will make the relationship built through mapping more fragile. You'll no longer know if this promising mapper that you really like has been actually secretly using AI, you'll no longer know if your favorite mapper's latest update has been completely AI-generated, and you'll no longer know if this efficient, prolific cool low-diff mapping folk has in fact been benefiting from AI since who knows when.

+1. It's not fun to find out something you were looking at was secretly AI, whether that be a beatmap, an image, a website, etc.

Detecting AI is a separate - and important - issue, but it is doable.

also +1 to eph below me

i don't think the whole "we can use generative AI to make rote but accessible content for the majority of the people who interact with the game (lowdiffs)" is as compelling an argument for use of the technology as some seem to think it is

If you make a song cover, arrangement or remix. Is the song yours or are you stealing the original piece? If I based a song on a classical piece would you consider me a thief?

You could have the ai generate just the base rhythm for your map and you would replace/rearrange everything else or most objects, is that your map or not?
For hitsounds you could have the baseline (normal-hitnormals, claps, finishes) covered by ai and then just adjust the rest to your song/map.
You could use some ai generated slider shapes, would be that any different from taking sliders from random ranked maps and copying into your map?

I think the ai has a great potential for just being a tool, but I also wouldn't want to see fully ai generated maps in ranked section so I'm kind of in the middle here
I hope disclosed use of ai in cases same or similar cases to what I listed could be fine

Also people saying "it's taking out artists, creativity etc". Not true at all. If it discourages you to map, then you didn't do it for the art in the first place. If in theory ai maps got ranked, the creative mappers wouldn't suddenly stop mapping and if anything it would only discourage newer future mappers. Aspheria's statement "why even map anymore?" is just an insult for me and any other actual artist

@Eph: I don't see why. Mapping low diffs is widely regarded as boring drudgery and mappers are constantly chafing against the requirements to include low diffs in their sets. I think that for most songs, the bar for making a rankable low difficulty is very low, and newer players aren't able to evaluate/appreciate the abstract map qualities that AI maps lack (which is why they're just worse than normal maps from a mapping perspective imo).

Notwithstanding that, another argument I have is simpler: people are going to use AI to make maps. If it's banned, they're going to lie about it. If it is required to be reported, but allowed, those people may state that their maps used AI.

It doesn't have to be antagonistic.

im inclined to agree that ai should be banned from ranked
however
1. i dont see a reason why ai hitsounds should be banned? most of the time, hitsounds are not a creative creation by a person, they're just 1:1 representing the song at the bare minimum level because maps needs to have hitsounds
ai hitsounds literally do not take anything from this as they work the same - and anyone looking to create something more will definitely not use ai for that reason

2. low diffs have been brought up and its still interesting point to look at because let's be honest, low diffs are in lot of ways similar to hitsounds - bare minimum made in short amount of time just because ranking criteria forces you to have them. yes, you can make creative low diffs and they exist out there. no, majority of people doesn't bother. like with hitsounds, ai generated low diffs would typically be of same quality - if not higher to be honest
not saying here low diffs should be an exception from this, because it still feels iffy to me as its well, the map, but i can definitely see it both ways

EDIT: nao's 2nd paragraph above is also very much true

Nao Tomori wrote:

@Eph: I don't see why. Mapping low diffs is widely regarded as boring drudgery and mappers are constantly chafing against the requirements to include low in their sets. I think that for most songs, the bar for making a rankable low difficulty is very low, and newer players aren't able to evaluate/appreciate the abstract map qualities that AI maps lack (which is why they're just worse than normal maps from a mapping perspective imo).

there are plenty of people who enjoy mapping low diffs. additionally, if you're mapping a new song then later a new player wants to play that song but yours the only set of it and you don't have any diffs they can play, that's not accessible. the current spread requirements, while I don't personally agree with them, do ensure that new players aren't mostly stuck to only what already exists and can actually play the new songs they'd want to play as well.

Nao Tomori wrote:

Notwithstanding that, another argument I have is simpler: people are going to use AI to make maps. If it's banned, they're going to lie about it. If it is required to be reported, but allowed, those people may state that their maps used AI.

It doesn't have to be antagonistic.

I've already asked peppy about this through email, but I don't think he's that willing to accept it based on his reply

Aspheria wrote:

there are plenty of people who enjoy mapping low diffs. additionally, if you're mapping a new song then later a new player wants to play that song but yours the only set of it and you don't have any diffs they can play, that's not accessible. the current spread requirements, while I don't personally agree with them, do ensure that new players aren't mostly stuck to only what already exists and can actually play the new songs they'd want to play as well.

This is in my opinion an argument in favor of allowing AI low difficulties, as it makes it must more feasible to require more maps to include low difficulties, increasing accessibility.

People who do enjoy making low diffs are able to make low diffs by themselves. They aren't affected.

Nao Tomori wrote:

This is in my opinion an argument in favor of allowing AI low difficulties, as it makes it must more feasible to require more maps to include low difficulties, increasing accessibility.

People who do enjoy making low diffs are about to make low diffs by themselves. They aren't affected.

it's more of a "if you don't want to map low diffs, there are others you can easily ask to do it for you"

wiwit wrote:

Also people saying "it's taking out artists, creativity etc". Not true at all. If it discourages you to map, then you didn't do it for the art in the first place. If in theory ai maps got ranked, the creative mappers wouldn't suddenly stop mapping and if anything it would only discourage newer future mappers. Aspheria's statement "why even map anymore?" is just an insult for me and any other actual artist

I think it would discourage new mappers from getting started - many of them map to be able to make a map, any map, of a song they like, which is always a legitimate motivation to map at any skill level. The shortcut provided by AI is, as Ephemeral said, a Faustian bargain.
It could also cause otherwise creative mappers to just use AI instead of mapping a set or e.g. an Insane diff within that set.

I've already conveyed my thoughts internally on this but here's an official statement from me.

From *day one*, osu! has always been about the creative process of mapping—it's the reason I made the game and, to me at least, a core gameplay loop. Allowing use of AI to generate (or assist in generation) of maps undermines the spirit of what makes osu! unique, turning a creative and skill-based activity into something automated and impersonal.

I'd go as far as saying that I see use of AI for mapping as form of cheating, bypassing the discovery process, challenge, and final satisfaction that come from crafting a beatmap by hand.

Arguing that AI should be allowed for the "menial" or "boring" portions will not only lead to a slippery slope and mappers and modders becoming complacent, but I'd argue that it's simply *not required* with the number of competent mappers we have in the community in 2025 – more than ever.

I do not see *any* form of AI assisted mapping as having a place within the osu! community's core values and hope that the majority would agree with this.

I understand AI is a hot topic and everyone has their own opinions on it (just look at how active this thread and how quick everyone is to jump in) but this is mine when it comes to osu! and I do not foresee my opinion on this changing.

(for clarification, when referring to AI, i mean anything that is more than an algorithm. helper tools which template or generate hitobjects, timing, or anything else, which are based on user inputs creating a given deterministic output, where the source code is available and has no black-box logic, are fine).

Agree that a map (a diff) entirely generated by AI should be unrankable.

Disagree that any AI assistance should be disallowed, this is just a witch hunt. AI could greatly help reducing the boring part of mapping like placing most of the notes to the rhythm and leave a mapper with more creative tasks like arranging the notes in a more sensible way, emphasizing something in the song, etc.

If AI is used as a tool rather than being a map's sole author, why (and how) would you disallow that?

peppy wrote:

I've already conveyed my thoughts internally on this but here's an official statement from me.

From *day one*, osu! has always been about the creative process of mapping—it's the reason I made the game and, to me at least, a core gameplay loop. Allowing use of AI to generate (or assist in generation) of maps undermines the spirit of what makes osu! unique, turning a creative and skill-based activity into something automated and impersonal.

I'd go as far as saying that I see use of AI for mapping as form of cheating, bypassing the discovery process, challenge, and final satisfaction that come from crafting a beatmap by hand.

Arguing that AI should be allowed for the "menial" or "boring" portions will not only lead to a slippery slope and mappers and modders becoming complacent, but I'd argue that it's simply *not required* with the number of competent mappers we have in the community in 2025 – more than ever.

I do not see *any* form of AI assisted mapping as having a place within the osu! community's core values and hope that the majority would agree with this.

I understand AI is a hot topic and everyone has their own opinions on it (just look at how active this thread and how quick everyone is to jump in) but this is mine when it comes to osu! and I do not foresee my opinion on this changing.

(for clarification, when referring to AI, i mean anything that is more than an algorithm. helper tools which template or generate hitobjects, timing, or anything else, which are based on user inputs creating a given deterministic output, where the source code is available and has no black-box logic, are fine).

Agree fully with peppy

generally neutral about this, even if i feel it could be prone to abuse in some extreme cases with mass-reporting and the fact that it's hardly verifiable to determine the work's authenticity (currently).

the only thing that should be removed from the rule is the timing part (exclusively the timing part, not about the hitsounds or volumes). i don't really agree that you shouldn't be not able to rank a beatmap if an ai let you time from it, timing is almost objective and you cannot deny it.

funny edge-case i found is treating the ai beatmap like a gd'er lmao : beatmapsets/1782195#taiko/3661464 (futsuu)
guess these should be handled too

peppy wrote:

I've already conveyed my thoughts internally on this but here's an official statement from me.

From *day one*, osu! has always been about the creative process of mapping—it's the reason I made the game and, to me at least, a core gameplay loop. Allowing use of AI to generate (or assist in generation) of maps undermines the spirit of what makes osu! unique, turning a creative and skill-based activity into something automated and impersonal.

I'd go as far as saying that I see use of AI for mapping as form of cheating, bypassing the discovery process, challenge, and final satisfaction that come from crafting a beatmap by hand.

Arguing that AI should be allowed for the "menial" or "boring" portions will not only lead to a slippery slope and mappers and modders becoming complacent, but I'd argue that it's simply *not required* with the number of competent mappers we have in the community in 2025 – more than ever.

I do not see *any* form of AI assisted mapping as having a place within the osu! community's core values and hope that the majority would agree with this.

I understand AI is a hot topic and everyone has their own opinions on it (just look at how active this thread and how quick everyone is to jump in) but this is mine when it comes to osu! and I do not foresee my opinion on this changing.

(for clarification, when referring to AI, i mean anything that is more than an algorithm. helper tools which template or generate hitobjects, timing, or anything else, which are based on user inputs creating a given deterministic output, where the source code is available and has no black-box logic, are fine).

yes

In the case of timing, there are already tools that could roughly get the bpm of a song (single bpm). There's a case to be made for variable timing with the help of gen AI (will mostly likely require human intervention for fine tuning)

So at the very least, the bottom proposed option shouldn't take effect imo

realy0_ wrote:

the only thing that should be removed from the rule is the timing part (exclusively the timing part, not about the hitsounds or volumes). i don't really agree that you shouldn't be not able to rank a beatmap if an ai let you time from it, timing is almost objective and you cannot deny it.

agree, timing is objective and the least creative part of mapping

otherwise agree with peppy

peppy wrote:

(for clarification, when referring to AI, i mean anything that is more than an algorithm. helper tools which template or generate hitobjects, timing, or anything else, which are based on user inputs creating a given deterministic output, where the source code is available and has no black-box logic, are fine).

I think this should be implemented into the proposal in some way. Maybe "Any tool with a deterministic output, such as template tools or difficulty mergers, is allowed".

i have a curious question. how to identify a map that is a ai generated map? someone would imitate a famous mapper style maybe others say that is a ai generated map.

@Noob_Oni drawing from what I've seen myself, take this with a grain of salt

If it's an inexperienced mapper and they used AI, you will likely see some VERY questionable mapping choices (not some accidental mistakes like unsnaps) in the middle of a generally ok map, which if they're experienced enough to make such map they probably won't troll that hard

For experienced mappers they can cover their fraud well enough so most of the time you can't really notice

Okoayu wrote:

1. A beatmap's hit objects, hitsounds and timing must be created exclusively by direct human input without the use of any generative tooling. Creating beatmaps is a fundamentally creative process, so using shortcuts like generative AI is unacceptable for ranking.

this is still leaving out storyboarding, which, as I mentioned earlier, is bound to be ai generated later down the road. the way it's currently written implies that while hit objects, hitsounds, and timing are not ok, storyboards are ok to be ai generated

personally, i think ai timing specifically could be something that is beneficial to the community: more maps could be made that would've otherwise been extremely difficult to time in the first place, so we could have a higher opportunity for community expression within the ranked section. things like decimal bpms and simply off-time bpms (thanks to things like live recordings and artist choice) are increasingly common as music-making gains more and more depth, and ai timing could help new and experienced mappers keep up with music they enjoy.

people also already use the likes of arrow-vortex for timing which has not harmed the ranked ecosystem at all.

however, i am also of the stance that ai mapping for ANYTHING is bad as that defeats the purpose of ugc beatmaps - quantity is not quality and all ai beatmaps would provide is quantity. you can argue that ai will eventually become OBJECTIVELY good at charting, but the beatmap section should be a place for the community to flourish and showcase what they have to offer ultimately.

> I also am not 100% sure on "is AI generating placement and then changing it fine". My gut stance says probably not. Don't know if that's worth clarifying?

I'd say NO, specially since generative tools such as AI collect data from ranked mapsets, maps that were made by other people using their own creativity. Considering this, having the AI create a map off of other's people work and then you change the positioning, a few sliders etc would basically mean it was made by you + who knows how many other people.

Also wouldn't that be considered a collab? If so all of us would just generate random maps and then adjust a few things accordingly, that still takes out the creative factor, it's like buying a premade wooden table and painting it a different color.

For me, every source of AI-generated work should be discouraged and punished, obviously that's too much to ask for but we shouldn't be giving people the chance to use AI in any way for their mapsets other than 'for fun' maps, not suitable for ranked/loved/aspire/whatever other contests there are.

I'd like to ask why "AI timing" is included as disallowed for this proposal. There are a *lot* of softwares/programs online that help you time a song, so I'm not sure at what point this would be an issue. Is stuff like tempora disallowed? That one helps make timing a lot easier for you and it still requires human input to get the most accurate timing, it simply guides you and makes the process a lot easier.
It's not taking away any creativity, it is just making a tedious process for certain types of music a *lot* easier so I don't see the negatives in allowing "AI timing" (whatever that means)

If anything, it actually *enhances* creativity. Songs that were once barely accessible to many mappers because of how terrible it'd be to time it, would now be more available for them to map.

I agree with everything else though.

AI as a whole is incredibly destructive in many ways. Mapping is supposed to be the mapper's creative outlet, what makes this game interesting compared to the other rhythm games is its custom charting. Allowing something that is essentially non-human into ranked sections destroys what makes mapping interesting as it just promotes "AI slop".
The fact this has to be a discussion is absurd to me, as I feel like the option is crystal clear.

I support this proposal

My position, in short: include auto-timing in lazer (which would be a positive without any downsides actually), and disallow everything else. Eph's commentary on why ai mapping should not be a thing is pretty much on point and i was thinking the same way since day 0.

Regarding rc change itself: ai hitsounds should absolutely be disallowed, just as ai object-placing, so i would go with the last proposed version by oko, and exclude timing from it

Why does the OP not even include any reasoning for this proposal other than a vague reference to a recent event which many people don't know about because no details were posted in the map discussion pages? It mentions the "team stance" but doesn't even explain what this stance is?
Some other people did offer explanations, but a lot of these opinions seem overly close-minded by the "AI bad" bias, or even seemingly misunderstand how AI actually works (and just equate it to copying or "stealing" content which isn't the case).

There was a recent thread in the mapping discussion subforum on the same topic which could be interesting to read for additional opinions, specifically my post replying to most of the concerns: community/forums/posts/9926545

Stompy_ wrote:

Feel like this thought process undermines a lot of attention to detail and effort that many mappers put into their maps.
Mapping isn't about ranking a map by any means necessary, it's about people putting their own creativity, their own personality and ways of creating a rhythm game level around a song they like.

Same goes for any type of design, art, creation.
The human factor is important and shouldn't so easily be brushed aside.

Process does in fact matter a lot.

Following this logic, maps that try to copy another mapper should also be unrankable though. Besides, many human-created maps don't have much attention to detail and effort in their process, but they get ranked just fine.

niat0004 wrote:

However, I'm very much against AI generation of low difficulties, since you can be creative in low difficulties, and it's a bit disrespectful to beginners to say “we don't think you deserve a map made by hand”, even if that's not the point you're trying to make.

How is providing content for players who are less skilled (or who simply enjoy playing low diffs) disrespectful, but saying "we don't think you deserve a map for longer songs" (current spread rules) is fine?

Stompy_ wrote:

100% agree with what niat0004 wrote about AI generating low difficulties, first off they don't even take much time to create, only reason one would have for doing this is laziness I feel like.

Not to mention how much low difficulties matter in terms of getting new people into osu... really bad idea to make them effortless and uninspired...

I don't think this argument is valid when most mappers only include lower difficulties in their maps if absolutely necessary (and often don't even map them by themselves). Many low diffs are already extremely "effortless and uninspired" as you said, and it doesn't seem like the majority of mappers genuinely cares about them, so being concerned about quality is a ridiculous double standard here.

Ephemeral wrote:

RC wording notwithstanding, the major existential threat AI/generative mapping poses is the "scooping" of entry and mid-level creators. posit that you're a new mapper dude looking to get started: how likely are you to continue learning a new (and rather difficult) craft when content close to your technical capabilities for the next few months/years can be generated in seconds?

the answer for most people is "not very", which in essence turns the acceptance of generative beatmapping into a Faustian bargain that gets us more mediocre beatmaps now for a significantly contracted and disengaged mapper scene later. in internal discussions it has been described as analogous to cheating software in terms of the disruption and damage it causes to osu! as a community, and while some might consider that classification extreme at a surface level, it really isn't that far off the mark if you think about it

I think people who like to express their creativity and enjoy making something themselves will continue to do so (or start getting into it) regardless of AI, especially if the AI model isn't able to accurately create their interpretation of the song. This concern also seems to contradict RandomeLoL's statement "The whole point of mapping should be to have fun in the process" because if it's just about the process, it wouldn't matter whether it can be "skipped" since it's the fun part so people should want to experience it. But that's the thing - you can't define what the point of mapping is for everyone, you can only define it for yourself. If someone wants to create maps just for the final product and not the process, why is that wrong? We shouldn't gatekeep beatmap creation just because that's how we experienced it.

Ryuusei Aika wrote:

Agree with the proposal and I would like to provide an additional argument that seemingly no one has mentioned yet:

Allowing AI-generated maps, no matter to which extent, will make the relationship built through mapping more fragile. You'll no longer know if this promising mapper that you really like has been actually secretly using AI, you'll no longer know if your favorite mapper's latest update was completely AI-generated, and you'll no longer know if this efficient, prolific cool low-diff mapping folk has in fact been benefiting from AI since who knows when. This would especially be true for players, who, as far as I've seen, can't really tell the difference between AI-generated maps and human-making maps. I am an AI believer and I believe AI mapping can be used in a lot of positive ways (such as low diff mapping as Nao said, or providing users a quick draft on songs they love but no one has mapped), but judging from the recent incident, it is clear that not everyone will be honestly crediting the AI usage, and I personally would hate to see this happen especially on long-time relationships, which largely outweighs my belief in the potential of AI in mapping per se.

But if you can't tell the difference between a map made by one of your favorite mappers and an AI generated one, I don't see why it's such a big deal how said map was made. It either means the AI model is incredibly good or the mapper isn't that great or unique. This conflicts with arguments about AI just producing low quality maps which several people have claimed.



I have to agree with Nao that banning doesn't really do anything because people will simply not disclose that their map is made with AI. Detection methods are either unreliable, not able to be used as evidence, or can easily be circumvented.

Just let these maps exist alongside regular maps, they won't suddenly go extinct because of that. Similarly, it doesn't stop anyone from mapping or enjoying the maps they like. Keep in mind that in order to get ranked, a map still has to follow the same rules, guidelines and quality standards no matter how it's made, and it needs 2 BNs who nominate it, so it doesn't really have a big effect on the ranked section after all.

Also, based on the current suggestions for this new rule, a lot of genuinely useful tools to make mapping easier or more efficient would become unrankable, such as some Mapping Tools components which are widely used by mappers.

i suppose we should address the elephant in the room a little bit: there's probably not going to be a reliable way to detect AI-created maps at any point throughout the enforcement of this prospective rule.

anyone who's followed the advent of generative AI in other creative spaces is likely well aware of the rapidly widening gulf in personalized & finetuned models that creep closer and closer towards being indistinguishable from real human output. that is 100% going to happen with generated beatmaps too, and there's not really anything lasting or enduring that can be done about it. it is already functionally impossible to detect ai-generated art when it has passed through the lens of an actually skilled artist able to compensate for its present shortcomings

put simply, the box is open and the tech is not going back in it any time soon.

however, this does not mean that osu! should not take a stance on the matter to broadcast expectations towards those who choose to contribute and create here. beatmaps should be created by people, for people, not stitched together by indiscernible algorithmic minutiae and spitshined into something passable.

Question, but how will it affect storyboarding scene? I know some people who are using AI for making some scripts, plus some people are using GenAI to fill up removed parts from the background to make parallax effect. It's not a case where all of the sprites or code was generated, but a case where small parts of it will be.

Will this be prohibited? Will it require people to also provide source code of their storyboard, if they weren't manually editing osb (majority use storybrew, some using another, sometimes, self-made converters in another languages)? How will it be detected then? Will it cause problems with ranking? Should we expand checking down to looking inside every sprite for containing GenAI stuff? Does it also imply that some AI for increasing image quality/removing background will be prohibited too and cause issues for ranking mapset?

Additional question came up. Photoshop, before 2022 had a Content-Aware fill. It's not the same as Generative fill (which is using Firefly AI), but on the thin ice, since it works by AI algorithms. Is this banned too?

De4n wrote:

Question, but how will it affect storyboarding scene? I know some people who are using AI for making some scripts, plus some people are using GenAI to fill up removed parts from the background to make parallax effect. It's not a case where all of the sprites or code was generated, but a case where small parts of it will be.

Will this be prohibited? Will it require people to also provide source code of their storyboard, if they weren't manually editing osb (majority use storybrew, some using another, sometimes, self-made converters in another languages)? How will it be detected then? Will it cause problems with ranking? Should we expand checking down to looking inside every sprite for containing GenAI stuff? Does it also imply that some AI for increasing image quality/removing background will be prohibited too and cause issues for ranking mapset?

I brought up to oko about storyboards, cause it got missed twice when I brought it up here. as he said, ai images are not prohibited, meaning yes you can keep using ai to fill what's missing. however, while I don't know the specifics behind the scene, my interpretation from his responses is ai generated osb scripting will be prohibited

De4n wrote:

Additional question came up. Photoshop, before 2022 had a Content-Aware fill. It's not the same as Generative fill (which is using Firefly AI), but on the thin ice, since it works by AI algorithms. Is this banned too?

as for this, peppy mentioned in his response that

peppy wrote:

helper tools which template or generate hitobjects, timing, or anything else, which are based on user inputs creating a given deterministic output, where the source code is available and has no black-box logic, are fine

the photoshop content fill does not provide a predictable result, as such we can already rule that out as despite doing something the same way multiple times, the result may vary drastically.

Aspheria wrote:

De4n wrote:

Question, but how will it affect storyboarding scene? I know some people who are using AI for making some scripts, plus some people are using GenAI to fill up removed parts from the background to make parallax effect. It's not a case where all of the sprites or code was generated, but a case where small parts of it will be.

Will this be prohibited? Will it require people to also provide source code of their storyboard, if they weren't manually editing osb (majority use storybrew, some using another, sometimes, self-made converters in another languages)? How will it be detected then? Will it cause problems with ranking? Should we expand checking down to looking inside every sprite for containing GenAI stuff? Does it also imply that some AI for increasing image quality/removing background will be prohibited too and cause issues for ranking mapset?

I brought up to oko about storyboards, cause it got missed twice when I brought it up here. as he said, ai images are not prohibited, meaning yes you can keep using ai to fill what's missing. however, while I don't know the specifics behind the scene, my interpretation from his responses is ai generated osb scripting will be prohibited

So to make sure. Fully generated AI images are banned and fully AI generated SBs are banned, right?

De4n wrote:

So to make sure. Fully generated AI images are banned and fully AI generated SBs are banned, right?

no, you are still allowed to use full ai images. we have plenty of those in ranked already.
for storyboards, the scripting will likely be banned if done by ai, but not the images.

also, I answered your additional question through my edit on my previous reply

Aspheria wrote:

the photoshop content fill does not provide a predictable result, as such we can already rule that out as despite doing something the same way multiple times, the result may vary drastically.

So what does it really mean? It's better to never use it or you still can?

I agree with both Nao Tomori and Serizawa Haruki.

You guys need to understand that after a certain point (human hands post-production), there's no way to fully proof that a map was indeed created by AI. My major concern here is people abusing this new rule to engage in pointless and petty discussions. 'I don't like this map and I think it's of subpar quality, THEREFORE it's AI slop.'

Also this assumption is not just a conjecture, but an observation of what happened with the art community literally witch hunting artists and all the drama caused by that.

You can create a rule regarding osu! stance on AI generated stuff, much like we have regarding audio and image licences, but beware that is almost impractical to enforce.

De4n wrote:

So what does it really mean? It's better to never use it or you still can?

the answer was about whether adobe content fill is the same as ai or not. we already established that ai images are currently allowed. I just explained that, by peppy's definition, the adobe content fill does fall into the realm with ai (personally I think it's just ai, they just say something else for marketing).


basically, as it currently stands, you can use it as it's about images, which ai images are not currently disallowed

Neto wrote:

I agree with both Nao Tomori and Serizawa Haruki.

You guys need to understand that after a certain point (human hands post-production), there's no way to fully proof that a map was indeed created by AI. My major concern here is people abusing this new rule to engage in pointless and petty discussions. 'I don't like this map and I think it's of subpar quality, THEREFORE it's AI slop.'

this is the only thing i'll be concerned about for new mappers who just attempted their first beatmap and probably their last beatmap because of overoverconstructive subjective feedback

Aspheria wrote:

De4n wrote:

So what does it really mean? It's better to never use it or you still can?

the answer was about whether adobe content fill is the same as ai or not. we already established that ai images are currently allowed. I just explained that, by peppy's definition, the adobe content fill does fall into the realm with ai (personally I think it's just ai, they just say something else for marketing).


basically, as it currently stands, you can use it as it's about images, which ai images are not currently disallowed

Okay, thank you. Yet so, I'll try to minimise the use of it, to prevent further problems.

I wrote a massive wall of text describing how and why it would be awful if people of low-mid skill level started losing motivation because of the ai because its not only about the process, results still matter to everyone, but then realised 1 simple thing:

If we officially allow ai maps into ranked section it will automatically be over for future model trainings because ai will start feeding on ai outputs and you reeeaaally don't want this to happen, so there is just no point in allowing it in the 1st place lol, otherwise you will have very obsolete training data in the future, which also kinda defeats the purpose.

If we disallow ai maps there would be a system similar to what we have with regular cheating now in the game itself - occasionally we will have drama with false allegations, sometimes someone will sneakily rank an ai map in disguise, bypassing all the detection techniques we have, there are no ways around that and we will have to simply deal with it, which with how it goes currently seems manageable, especially when proper detection tools will be developed and harsh enough punishments enforced for breaking the rules

Aspheria wrote:

no, you are still allowed to use full ai images. we have plenty of those in ranked already.
for storyboards, the scripting will likely be banned if done by ai, but not the images.

A lot of programmers nowadays use AI to support their work such as Copilot, and some scripts may require an extremily complex calculations, if a mapper write storyboard code line-by-line or with help from AI, what should count is the final result, the creativity, if it's polished, if it's appropriate for ranked maps. The usage of AI for heavly programmer oriented activities is nothing more than something expected.

I mostly agree with all of that, but I'm not sure about timings. Even hating AI in mapping, I think timing generation tools for some variable bpm song will be helpful and won't be that bad, because it's not the same way of creativity as mapping itself, but it's fine if timing generations will be prohibited too.

But also then we need to have some universal tools that will determine any usage of AI as accurately as possible

beatmapsets/83572#osu/263366 there has a map is mapped by auto map as the mapper claimed before ai is blooming. it seems mapper modify the map and make it ranked.

Noob_Oni wrote:

beatmapsets/83572#osu/263366 there has a map is mapped by auto map as the mapper claimed before ai is blooming. it seems mapper modify the map and make it ranked.

I think with this we went quite far, since I thought initially we were talking about GenAI mapping and this one, according to it's age is way too far from it

Let's for now please stick with the proposal. No need to start talking about "But X was Ranked in the past" when this new rule is to be applied from thereon — just like any other new rule, really.

Moreover, do check peppy's clarification (the very last paragraph) which goes into what AI Tools entail. Tools with deterministic output that do not make use of a convolutional neural network or similar to "reason" user input are fine.

AI is Software, but not all Software is AI.

RandomeLoL wrote:

AI is Software, but not all Software is AI.

+1 to make sure the wording is clear between the difference between the two. Mapset Verifier and Mapping Tools are useful and have generally wide use cases with already finished beatmaps, copying hitsounds and adding gds to sets.

Adding to the general consensus already, I think it's very important to distinguish between what is software vs AI when creating the new rules. Making sure tools that SBers and Modders use aren't included when they have a predetermined input that can be used to highlight issues or SBers using external tools.
As an edge case, I think that SBer's who are coding stuff for their SBs should be allowed to use Gen-LLM tools if it assists them with making their desired background graphics/shaders. More competent people at making them should comment on this but I don't see an issue with it if it helps them make their own custom SB at the end of the day.


The general problem lies with that actual game play that comes from maps being generated (by Mapperatorinator or other tools). Whether that's low or high star difficulties and hitsounding, these are all a part of the creative process which people take massive pride in doing. Gimmick low star diffs, keysounding, etc. I'm inclined to be ok with letting timing be done by AI since it allows the creative process to start (that being no hit objects are added to the map only timing points) but actual gameplay should be the focus in making sure that all of it is hand done.

TL;DR: Mapping & hitsounds should be done by mappers. It's important to distinguish useful established software like MV and MT! to be able to continue to be used.
Storyboarder's should be allowed to use external tools & Gen-LLM like to code externally for their storyboard's, as well as timing being allowed to be done by AI in order for people to start mapping but not the actual generation of the beatmap.

Also, if we're going to be punishing people who try to rank AI maps with very long silences or restrictions in the future, that's fine (given the level of malicious intent necessary), but that should be made very clear as this is a Ranking Criterion, the violations of which normally are not punished with silences or restrictions.

I suggest an addition like the following italicised part: "A beatmap's hit objects, hitsounds and timing must be created exclusively by direct human input without the use of any generative tooling. Creating beatmaps is a fundamentally creative process, so using shortcuts like generative AI is unacceptable for ranking. Attempting to rank a beatmap generated in this way may result in your account being restricted or a silence." (depending on what punishment moderators agree should be applied)

niat0004 wrote:

Also, if we're going to be punishing people who try to rank AI maps with very long silences or restrictions in the future, that's fine (given the level of malicious intent necessary), but that should be made very clear as this is a Ranking Criterion, the violations of which normally are not punished with silences or restrictions.

I suggest an addition like the following italicised part: "A beatmap's hit objects, hitsounds and timing must be created exclusively by direct human input without the use of any generative tooling. Creating beatmaps is a fundamentally creative process, so using shortcuts like generative AI is unacceptable for ranking. Attempting to rank a beatmap generated in this way may result in your account being restricted or a silence." (depending on what punishment moderators agree should be applied)

I really don't think banning/restricting users for this is reasonable considering that not even people who literally stole someone else's map receive this kind of punishment.

I think that AI mapping should be prohibited for now; because, among other reasons that were mentioned, it would flood the already overwhelmed BN and modding queues with maps. We are in a never ending BN crisis, the last thing we need is more maps for the same number of BNs, since AI assisted mapping will result in maps being made faster and mappers deciding to make more maps than before or have their maps include a larger difficulty spread.

AI will not result in more ranked maps, since our bottleneck isn't maps - it's the number of BNs.

Serizawa Haruki wrote:

niat0004 wrote:

Also, if we're going to be punishing people who try to rank AI maps with very long silences or restrictions in the future, that's fine (given the level of malicious intent necessary), but that should be made very clear as this is a Ranking Criterion, the violations of which normally are not punished with silences or restrictions.

I suggest an addition like the following italicised part: "A beatmap's hit objects, hitsounds and timing must be created exclusively by direct human input without the use of any generative tooling. Creating beatmaps is a fundamentally creative process, so using shortcuts like generative AI is unacceptable for ranking. Attempting to rank a beatmap generated in this way may result in your account being restricted or a silence." (depending on what punishment moderators agree should be applied)

I really don't think banning/restricting users for this is reasonable considering that not even people who literally stole someone else's map receive this kind of punishment.

Regardless of whether the punishment is a long silence or a restriction, if you're going to punish someone for something only in the RC, make that explicitly clear. If you want to deter people from sneaking AI maps to rank, it can't hurt to make the penalty clear.

The argument for a restriction is, however, that to rank an AI map, you have to intentionally deceive two BNs for a long period of time, and if you achieve your goal, you may compromise the integrity of Ranked further.

Separately, replying to this:

Serizawa Haruki wrote:

How is providing content for players who are less skilled (or who simply enjoy playing low diffs) disrespectful, but saying "we don't think you deserve a map for longer songs" (current spread rules) is fine?

You can still provide this content in the Graveyard. However, Ranked expects a significant human effort, and an AI map being ranked would be considered a severe violation of the integrity of Ranked since making ranked maps shouldn't be automatable. Even the worst PP slop mapsets take hours to make, all aspects (metadata, hit sounding, etc.) considered. I know GDers exist, but the total man-hours would still be about the same.

Ideally, almost all songs would have full spreads (and MPG encourages this), but this would limit the Ranked section because mappers ain't mapping all that. The spread rules are a compromise.
I think AI-generating low diffs for a song and putting them in the Graveyard for beginners to play is slightly better than no map at all, but not in Ranked.

I'll include storyboard scripts in the excluded things i think.

edit: brought this up internally, and we opted to not go for that at this time (the act of generating or using assisting tools doesn't undermine the creative process to the same degree as actually generating gameplay relevant parts of your map)

timing was included, because on average it is pretty meh? I'm personally pretty indifferent about timing because there's less room for creative expression than like any other mapping related aspect. In most cases you still need someone with knowledge to doublecheck the work by whatever tool is used and adjust it per-game mode depending on playability, ideally

Regarding any silences or restrictions - please understand as mentioned before, it would basically be considered as cheating software and the community rules could be updated to reflect this. Or if it ends up with a different solution it would be there.

Being in ranking criteria or not would be an extra layer of clarification.

Serizawa Haruki wrote:

Ryuusei Aika wrote:

Agree with the proposal and I would like to provide an additional argument that seemingly no one has mentioned yet:

Allowing AI-generated maps, no matter to which extent, will make the relationship built through mapping more fragile. You'll no longer know if this promising mapper that you really like has been actually secretly using AI, you'll no longer know if your favorite mapper's latest update was completely AI-generated, and you'll no longer know if this efficient, prolific cool low-diff mapping folk has in fact been benefiting from AI since who knows when. This would especially be true for players, who, as far as I've seen, can't really tell the difference between AI-generated maps and human-making maps. I am an AI believer and I believe AI mapping can be used in a lot of positive ways (such as low diff mapping as Nao said, or providing users a quick draft on songs they love but no one has mapped), but judging from the recent incident, it is clear that not everyone will be honestly crediting the AI usage, and I personally would hate to see this happen especially on long-time relationships, which largely outweighs my belief in the potential of AI in mapping per se.

But if you can't tell the difference between a map made by one of your favorite mappers and an AI generated one, I don't see why it's such a big deal how said map was made. It either means the AI model is incredibly good or the mapper isn't that great or unique. This conflicts with arguments about AI just producing low quality maps which several people have claimed.

It is a big deal to me, mostly relationship-building wise.

If I have been talking with someone who maps really well in my opinion -- the conversation with whom I'd then enjoy -- there will be a big difference for me once I know they didn't disclose the AI usage in their maps. It makes me feel that they're being dishonest with me. This will, however, mostly be untrue because I am able to tell the difference between AI-generated maps and actual good maps, so I don't see this would be an issue for me, or many of the experienced mappers. Hence, I agree that your claim would mostly stay true among experienced mappers, for a while.

Now, change the subject to players -- which was my main concern in my initial post -- they can't tell the difference between AI-generated maps and actual good maps, because the majority of them don't share the definition of "low quality" with the experienced mapper group. (As we can see under the comments/QRT of the tweet of Mapperatorinator V30, a lot of players can't tell the difference between AI generated maps and maps they usually play.) Therefore, it is more likely that the scenario above would happen to players. If I now tell all the reading players that Heat Abnormal is AI-generated, how would they feel? A lot of players will be shocked; their belief in me (if they have any) will be shattered, and it will make it harder for them to believe anything that I say from that moment on. And that will definitely not be a good feeling for them.

Therefore, although I agree with you that AI is not as good as experienced mappers, this is from the perspective of an experienced mapper myself. This is different for players, the user group that we mappers will more or less need to cater to in the Ranked section, who also possess a very different definition of "good quality" with mappers, which is evidenced in the feedback towards Mapperatorinator V30. Players play Ranked maps and slowly build their relationship with their favorite mappers from the maps they "like to play". In this process, the belief in the "human-making" plays an indispensable, albeit sometimes unnoticed, role. Removing the reliability of the "human-making" per se by not disclosing the usage of AI in mapping would harm the integrity of the community as a whole, because a positive relationship in this game should always be built based on honesty between humans; lying would just destroy the belief that's been built through this process. And this is my biggest concern, way bigger than anything else that were mentioned in this thread.

I am aware that this will always happen regardless of the existence of AI (like cheating, inappropriate behavior of well-acclaimed players and mappers). However it does not mean that consequently all the regulations would be pointless (as said by some people in this thread already); osu! is a community-driven game, and measures should always be taken to make sure that everyone can have a worry-free experience when they're making friends with each other, hence my fully supportive stance of the proposal (excluding timing, as I said in my initial post).

gonna give my insights to aika's post from my player perspective

Ryuusei Aika wrote:

Now, change the subject to players -- which was my main concern in my initial post -- they can't tell the difference between AI-generated maps and actual good maps, because the majority of them don't share the definition of "low quality" with the experienced mapper group.

even as an experienced mapper, when I play the game I don't think through the lens of a mapper. if a map feels bad, I don't think about it and just chalk it up as probably inexperienced mapper or map just doesn't align with my playstyle, as such I wouldn't even realize a map is ai unless I specifically checked it in the editor as a mapper, which I never do while playing

Ryuusei Aika wrote:

If I now tell all the reading players that Heat Abnormal is AI-generated, how would they feel? A lot of players will be shocked; their belief in me (if they have any) will be shattered, and it will make it harder for them to believe anything that I say from that moment on. And that will definitely not be a good feeling for them.

as someone who spent about 20 hours grinding for an EZHT fc on Heat Abnormal, and is still working for EZHTFL and EZFL scores, I'd feel betrayed. I'd feel like the effort I put into my scores invalidated by the fact that the map would hold no valuable meaning to anyone. additionally I currently hold you as one of my favourite mappers, as a player, and finding out that your maps were ai generated would genuinely sadden me as the works I enjoyed from a person I genuinely look up to would just be some low effort work of laziness. I'd never be able to trust you again, and I'd even start questioning if some of my other favourite mappers are secretly doing the same. it would really hurt.

niat0004 wrote:

Serizawa Haruki wrote:

niat0004 wrote:

Also, if we're going to be punishing people who try to rank AI maps with very long silences or restrictions in the future, that's fine (given the level of malicious intent necessary), but that should be made very clear as this is a Ranking Criterion, the violations of which normally are not punished with silences or restrictions.

I suggest an addition like the following italicised part: "A beatmap's hit objects, hitsounds and timing must be created exclusively by direct human input without the use of any generative tooling. Creating beatmaps is a fundamentally creative process, so using shortcuts like generative AI is unacceptable for ranking. Attempting to rank a beatmap generated in this way may result in your account being restricted or a silence." (depending on what punishment moderators agree should be applied)

I really don't think banning/restricting users for this is reasonable considering that not even people who literally stole someone else's map receive this kind of punishment.

Regardless of whether the punishment is a long silence or a restriction, if you're going to punish someone for something only in the RC, make that explicitly clear. If you want to deter people from sneaking AI maps to rank, it can't hurt to make the penalty clear.

The argument for a restriction is, however, that to rank an AI map, you have to intentionally deceive two BNs for a long period of time, and if you achieve your goal, you may compromise the integrity of Ranked further.

That's not necessarily true though, someone could not be aware of this rule and not have any malicious intentions with it. If not even plagiarism (which is pretty much always done in bad faith) is treated this harshly, it doesn't make sense to resort to these measures for using AI. I'm not sure what you mean by compromising the "integrity of Ranked", for all we know there might be several AI generated maps in ranked right now, and I don't see how anything fundamentally changes because of that.

niat0004 wrote:

Separately, replying to this:

Serizawa Haruki wrote:

How is providing content for players who are less skilled (or who simply enjoy playing low diffs) disrespectful, but saying "we don't think you deserve a map for longer songs" (current spread rules) is fine?

You can still provide this content in the Graveyard. However, Ranked expects a significant human effort, and an AI map being ranked would be considered a severe violation of the integrity of Ranked since making ranked maps shouldn't be automatable. Even the worst PP slop mapsets take hours to make, all aspects (metadata, hit sounding, etc.) considered. I know GDers exist, but the total man-hours would still be about the same.

Ideally, almost all songs would have full spreads (and MPG encourages this), but this would limit the Ranked section because mappers ain't mapping all that. The spread rules are a compromise.
I think AI-generating low diffs for a song and putting them in the Graveyard for beginners to play is slightly better than no map at all, but not in Ranked.

The "graveyard" argument has been commonly used to gatekeep certain mapping styles from ranked ("people can still play graved maps if they're playing for fun and not PP"), but just like the infamous "this should be loved and not ranked" statement, it's a fallacy because that's not the purpose of these categories. A map that follows the RC and meets certain quality standards isn't meant to rot in the graveyard unless the mapper doesn't go for ranked or abandons it. To make an analogy with spread rules, it's like arguing against this compromise of omitting lower difficulties based on map length because "you can still provide this content in the graveyard" if you don't want to make a full spread.
Your claims about what should and shouldn't be ranked are merely your opinion, not hard facts. Also, the amount of time it took to map something is irrelevant when assessing the rankability of a map. Only the quality of the result is judged, not the creation process, which is why low effort maps get ranked all the time, and as long as they're good, there's nothing wrong with that.

Noffy wrote:

Regarding any silences or restrictions - please understand as mentioned before, it would basically be considered as cheating software and the community rules could be updated to reflect this. Or if it ends up with a different solution it would be there.

Being in ranking criteria or not would be an extra layer of clarification.

Why would it basically be considered cheating? This comparison makes no sense as the context is completely different. Gameplay is inherently competitive considering it's an online game with rankings, leaderboards etc. so cheating messes with this aspect. But mapping isn't and shouldn't be competitive. Like many people said, it's a creative process, so there is no cheating.

Ryuusei Aika wrote:

Serizawa Haruki wrote:

Ryuusei Aika wrote:

Agree with the proposal and I would like to provide an additional argument that seemingly no one has mentioned yet:

Allowing AI-generated maps, no matter to which extent, will make the relationship built through mapping more fragile. You'll no longer know if this promising mapper that you really like has been actually secretly using AI, you'll no longer know if your favorite mapper's latest update was completely AI-generated, and you'll no longer know if this efficient, prolific cool low-diff mapping folk has in fact been benefiting from AI since who knows when. This would especially be true for players, who, as far as I've seen, can't really tell the difference between AI-generated maps and human-making maps. I am an AI believer and I believe AI mapping can be used in a lot of positive ways (such as low diff mapping as Nao said, or providing users a quick draft on songs they love but no one has mapped), but judging from the recent incident, it is clear that not everyone will be honestly crediting the AI usage, and I personally would hate to see this happen especially on long-time relationships, which largely outweighs my belief in the potential of AI in mapping per se.

But if you can't tell the difference between a map made by one of your favorite mappers and an AI generated one, I don't see why it's such a big deal how said map was made. It either means the AI model is incredibly good or the mapper isn't that great or unique. This conflicts with arguments about AI just producing low quality maps which several people have claimed.

It is a big deal to me, mostly relationship-building wise.

If I have been talking with someone who maps really well in my opinion -- the conversation with whom I'd then enjoy -- there will be a big difference for me once I know they didn't disclose the AI usage in their maps. It makes me feel that they're being dishonest with me. This will, however, mostly be untrue because I am able to tell the difference between AI-generated maps and actual good maps, so I don't see this would be an issue for me, or many of the experienced mappers. Hence, I agree that your claim would mostly stay true among experienced mappers, for a while.

Now, change the subject to players -- which was my main concern in my initial post -- they can't tell the difference between AI-generated maps and actual good maps, because the majority of them don't share the definition of "low quality" with the experienced mapper group. (As we can see under the comments/QRT of the tweet of Mapperatorinator V30, a lot of players can't tell the difference between AI generated maps and maps they usually play.) Therefore, it is more likely that the scenario above would happen to players. If I now tell all the reading players that Heat Abnormal is AI-generated, how would they feel? A lot of players will be shocked; their belief in me (if they have any) will be shattered, and it will make it harder for them to believe anything that I say from that moment on. And that will definitely not be a good feeling for them.

Therefore, although I agree with you that AI is not as good as experienced mappers, this is from the perspective of an experienced mapper myself. This is different for players, the user group that we mappers will more or less need to cater to in the Ranked section, who also possess a very different definition of "good quality" with mappers, which is evidenced in the feedback towards Mapperatorinator V30. Players play Ranked maps and slowly build their relationship with their favorite mappers from the maps they "like to play". In this process, the belief in the "human-making" plays an indispensable, albeit sometimes unnoticed, role. Removing the reliability of the "human-making" per se by not disclosing the usage of AI in mapping would harm the integrity of the community as a whole, because a positive relationship in this game should always be built based on honesty between humans; lying would just destroy the belief that's been built through this process. And this is my biggest concern, way bigger than anything else that were mentioned in this thread.

I am aware that this will always happen regardless of the existence of AI (like cheating, inappropriate behavior of well-acclaimed players and mappers). However it does not mean that consequently all the regulations would be pointless (as said by some people in this thread already); osu! is a community-driven game, and measures should always be taken to make sure that everyone can have a worry-free experience when they're making friends with each other, hence my fully supportive stance of the proposal (excluding timing, as I said in my initial post).

I don't disagree with your overall sentiment, however this is not something that is affected/stopped by prohibiting it. Even if AI generated maps were not allowed, you would still be disappointed if that mapper you really like is found to be using AI. On the other hand, if it's allowed, people would at least have the option to be honest about it (obviously no guarantee but that's a given), and those who don't wish to engage with that content can avoid it.

a lot of good points are brought up. The current consensus with ai and anything having to relate to art is that ai generated stuff is labeled and similarly I think beatmaps should be labeled with an ai label similar to Featured artist etc.
Most people already don't feel great about AI so I think a tag would be most beneficial, as they'll see that AI maps are AI maps, and not skew their judgement and standards based on what they saw a few AI maps do.
This would probably solve the current debate of ranking an AI map... if you rank it, it'll still have the label and people will understand.
That being said, as maps in loved require a significant level of creativity, expression, individuality and personality: AI maps shouldn't be able to become loved.

As far as penalties go for the ranked section, I feel like not labeling a beatmap correctly as AI should permanently alter that beatmap's chances of staying ranked... If you don't label the beatmap, then the opportunity of warning the player that the map is AI mapped before they play it, review it, or mod it is gone. This way BNs maintain the final judgement on whether or not they decide to help rank an AI map.

As a newbie who just joined the OSU! community, seeing this discussion is honestly a bit shocking. I don’t know too much about mapping, but from what I understand, AI needs specific datasets to train on. That means programmers creating generative AI would likely download tons of OSU! maps for training.
I've read through the comments here, and most folks are focused on spotting AI-generated maps or restricting them. But just hypothetically—what if we could embed something into maps when users upload them? Something invisible to players but that disrupts or poisons AI training data?
Or, thinking bigger: many commercial AIs (like image generators) add hidden markers to their output. So if we can’t stop people from scraping map data, could we enforce rules to "mark" AI-generated maps? That way, even if one gets uploaded, we could detect it.
I'm no expert—this is just my two cents! Curious what others think.

NeruKujimi wrote:

I've read through the comments here, and most folks are focused on spotting AI-generated maps or restricting them. But just hypothetically—what if we could embed something into maps when users upload them? Something invisible to players but that disrupts or poisons AI training data?

it's not feasible as it can be easily removed by simply editing the .osu file, which is just plaintext
and if you already had the intent to deceive, you wouldn't leave the incriminating parts there when they'd be very easy to remove

after a short read id like to say that

"A beatmap's hit objects must be created exclusively by direct human input without the use of any generative tooling. Creating beatmaps is a fundamentally creative process, so using shortcuts like generative AI is unacceptable for ranking."

imo wud be best in this case. imho maps shudnt have any form of AI usage in them and they should not be ranked, massively undermines the creative work of thousands of mappers in this game

question exists in "how to differ AI-mapping products from tons of maps so that we can ban it" rather than "whether should we......"i thought,providing that depending on humanity is just too absurd.

Aspheria wrote:

NeruKujimi wrote:

I've read through the comments here, and most folks are focused on spotting AI-generated maps or restricting them. But just hypothetically—what if we could embed something into maps when users upload them? Something invisible to players but that disrupts or poisons AI training data?

it's not feasible as it can be easily removed by simply editing the .osu file, which is just plaintext
and if you already had the intent to deceive, you wouldn't leave the incriminating parts there when they'd be very easy to remove

I was thinking that you can add extra specific decimals (maybe an osu funny number like 727) to sv or certain timestamps randomly.

A green line would look like:
12000,-25.25727727727,4,3,0,100,0,1

A slider might look like:
100,100,12600,6,1,B|200:200|250:200|250:200|300:150,2,310.727727,2|1|2,0:0|0:0|0:2,0:0:0:0:

I think this kind of thing can make catching ai maps by beginners more trivial

smolship wrote:

Aspheria wrote:

NeruKujimi wrote:

I've read through the comments here, and most folks are focused on spotting AI-generated maps or restricting them. But just hypothetically—what if we could embed something into maps when users upload them? Something invisible to players but that disrupts or poisons AI training data?

it's not feasible as it can be easily removed by simply editing the .osu file, which is just plaintext
and if you already had the intent to deceive, you wouldn't leave the incriminating parts there when they'd be very easy to remove

I was thinking that you can add extra specific decimals (maybe an osu funny number like 727) to sv or certain timestamps randomly.

A green line would look like:
12000,-25.25727727727,4,3,0,100,0,1

A slider might look like:
100,100,12600,6,1,B|200:200|250:200|250:200|300:150,2,310.727727,2|1|2,0:0|0:0|0:2,0:0:0:0:

I think this kind of thing can make catching ai maps by beginners more trivial

thing is as we realize what these are and start catching them, so do the people ai generating, so they can simply search for them and remove them before uploading. additionally, osu! would remove a lot of this as well, especially on coordinates as stable does not support decimals, and while I haven't tested decimal coords specifically, if there are things stable does not support, it generally either corrupts or removes them.

either way, having it be in the .osu would just be decide what the markers are, now that people know what the markers are so they know what to look for, the people using it know what to remove first

Aspheria wrote:

smolship wrote:

Aspheria wrote:

NeruKujimi wrote:

I've read through the comments here, and most folks are focused on spotting AI-generated maps or restricting them. But just hypothetically—what if we could embed something into maps when users upload them? Something invisible to players but that disrupts or poisons AI training data?

it's not feasible as it can be easily removed by simply editing the .osu file, which is just plaintext
and if you already had the intent to deceive, you wouldn't leave the incriminating parts there when they'd be very easy to remove

I was thinking that you can add extra specific decimals (maybe an osu funny number like 727) to sv or certain timestamps randomly.

A green line would look like:
12000,-25.25727727727,4,3,0,100,0,1

A slider might look like:
100,100,12600,6,1,B|200:200|250:200|250:200|300:150,2,310.727727,2|1|2,0:0|0:0|0:2,0:0:0:0:

I think this kind of thing can make catching ai maps by beginners more trivial

thing is as we realize what these are and start catching them, so do the people ai generating, so they can simply search for them and remove them before uploading. additionally, osu! would remove a lot of this as well, especially on coordinates as stable does not support decimals, and while I haven't tested decimal coords specifically, if there are things stable does not support, it generally either corrupts or removes them.

either way, having it be in the .osu would just be decide what the markers are, now that people know what the markers are so they know what to look for, the people using it know what to remove first

i just tested that slider length decimals and both red and green line decimals are saved exactly for 12 decimals. mapset verifier also does not detect unsnaps due to decimal changes in slider length.

just have more markers tbh, one open list for casual modders and bn with obvious numbers, one secret list for nat. only detect when markers are above some threshold