I've enjoyed seeing the efforts you put in to create your own images, and I try to have a similar mindset. I try to draw using Procreate as much as I can to go with things I put online. Even if they are bad, they are at least unique!

Having said that, I'm definitely playing around with AI art to see what's possible. My stance is that major publications should continue to pay illustrators for their original work to go along with their articles, but indie writers who otherwise would be using stock photos should 1st) try to create their own image in some way if possible, or 2nd) create AI work that is infinitely more interesting than bland stock photos (or 3rd: combination of both depending).

Because I write a lot about podcasts, in an effort to learn DALL-E 2 I thought it would be fun to imagine different AI images that could go along with typical articles about audio/podcasting:

https://medium.com/@erikthejones/never-use-stock-photos-in-podcasting-again-1563afa1784d