The four-square makes campaign decisions easy

The four squares

The map has two axes. One asks whether what you are showing has a real referent. The other asks whether you have the rights. From that follow four modes that cover nearly everything a marketing team encounters.

• The twin. Real people or places with a contract in place. Go — but remember the content still counts as a deepfake and therefore needs disclosure even with consent.
• The theft. Something real without permission. Never, no matter how obviously fake it is and no matter how it is labelled.
• The grey zone. Synthetic but with unclear origin. Stop and check. Does the cast resemble a real person, is a real place or protected artwork visible, is the material from an unknown tool?
• Your own world. Fully synthetic with documented origin. Free to go, with no visible labelling duty.

The labelling line

A dashed line runs through the middle of the map. To the left sits everything with a real referent, where the law may require a visible disclosure. To the right sits the fully synthetic. There is no such duty there — the tool's invisible provenance in the file is enough. One line, easy to point at in a status meeting.

The rule that applies in every square

Never lie about the product. The world around the item may be as fantastical as you like, but the item must look like itself and be able to do what the image promises. That is the same rule that has always applied to retouched photographs, and it is no less important when the images are generated.

Put the four-square in the brief, in onboarding and on the studio wall. When two questions cover most decisions, the lawyers can focus on the few that are genuinely hard.