AI Has A Dog In This Fight

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100 – November/December, 2026

By Ashlyn Navis

It is hard to imagine a group of hobbyists more visually obsessed than the dog fancy. We photograph wins, puppies, foundation dogs, stud dogs, veterans, specials, hopefuls, and once-in-a-lifetime heart dogs. We build visual advertisements around them, turn kennel names into logos (which we plaster on the side of a sprinter van or the back of a folding chair ringside). We preserve pedigrees through pictures, and we learn breed type by looking at the generations of dogs that came before ours.

So it is not surprising that generative artificial intelligence has hit the dog world with an unusual force. But what is more surprising is how a conversation that appears to be about technology quickly becomes a conversation about almost everything else the fancy values: originality, expertise, breed type, reputation, community, history, and trust.

Generative AI also raises important economic and environmental questions, but those broader debates are beyond the scope of this article; my focus here is on what AI may be changing within the culture of the dog fancy.

An anonymous survey was distributed online to members of the dog fancy in September 2026; it was intended to capture perspectives within the community rather than produce a representative sample, of the 700 who replied 84.7% said they frequently encounter AI-generated or AI-assisted dog content, more than 89.9% said they have encountered a dog photograph online that they suspected had been substantially AI-edited, and nearly 76.9% said they are not comfortable at all with AI being used in digital or printed dog-show advertising. But the free responses were far more interesting than the percentages. One respondent summarized their aesthetic objection in eight words:

“It’s just so beige. It’s all the same.”

INFINITE POSSIBILITIES, LESS ORIGINALITY?

Click here to read the complete article
100 – November/December, 2026

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Posted by AnthonyA on Nov 9 2026. Filed under Current Articles, Featured. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. Both comments and pings are currently closed.