Not sure why it would be better or not, just different.

But besides, I think many people are into it because what it represents, not what the actual pixels are on the screen. They are into it because they think it gives them a sneak-peek into their real life, with photos representing some sort of reality. When that illusion breaks, one way or another, people feel cheated.

This is true only if all the outcomes are the same. However “all the outcomes” includes long term outcomes of swapping the real for the fake, and historically there have been unanticipated consequences aka outcomes when doing so.

In the case of AI pornography, the scary outcome to me is that more people become addicted to internet pornography and the amount of healthy connections in society decreases.

Probably for the same reason that people will pay more for originals even if prints or copies are exact replicas and look just as nice.

I wonder if people would pay more for a print of an original artist's painting, or an exact hand-painted reproduction painting? At least the replica is still painted by an expert.

And a big plus is they, the Johns, can’t real-life stalk their objects of affection.