David J. Lee is Chief Operating Officer (COO) and Chief Financial Officer (CFO) for WEBTOON Entertainment, where he oversees global corporate, financial and operations teams for WEBTOON, Wattpad, and Wattpad WEBTOON Studios. Mr. Lee is also serving on the boards of WEBTOON Entertainment. A seasoned consumer and technology industry executive, he brings over 25 years of experience across a variety of finance leadership roles.
Prior to WEBTOON, David was the CEO of Inevitable Tech while serving on public company boards for AppHarvest, Benson Hill, and Zevia. Previously, he was the COO & CFO of Impossible Foods, where he successfully led the company’s launch of the Impossible Burger and its nationwide distribution.
WEBTOON is the world’s largest digital comics platform, home to some of the biggest artists, IP, and fandoms in comics. As the global leader and pioneer of the mobile webcomic format, WEBTOON has revolutionized the comics industry for comic fans and creators. Today, a diverse new generation of international comic artists have found a home on WEBTOON, where the company’s storytelling technology allows anyone to become a creator and build a global audience for their stories.
How does WEBTOON approach the ethical development of AI, particularly in light of concerns from artists about AI potentially replacing human creativity?
At WEBTOON, our approach to AI is centered around enhancing, not replacing, human creativity. Creators are at the center of everything we do – their success is our success. As a result, it’s crucial that we prioritize ethical AI development to ensure our tools support creators without undermining their artistic vision or livelihood. We use AI to boost productivity, enhance creativity and safeguard creators’ work. With over 24 million creators globally, our mission is to democratize storytelling and help Creators make money, not automate the creative process.
Can you elaborate on how tools like Shaper and Constella are designed to assist creators without compromising their artistic integrity? What specific feedback from creators led to the development of these tools?
First off, these are tools still in development. When we’re building new technology to support the creative process, it’s important that we take our time, consult with creators, and understand how these innovations can actually make their lives easier.
Like all of our tools, Shaper and Constella were built with a creator-first mindset. We know that our creators dedicate tremendous amounts of time to making webcomics for readers to enjoy, and these tools can help streamline their process, without compromising the unique artistic style of each creator. For example, many of our creators have indicated that their greatest pain point is the repetitive sketching involved in serialized content, like when a character changes a pose or clothing and the artist needs to start the sketch from scratch. While still in the testing phase, Shaper allows creators to build 3D character models in order to change a character’s poses seamlessly and without the need to sketch each pose. Another experimental product, Constella, powered by proprietary AI technology, will allow conversion of these 3D character models in various poses to natural looking 2D characters in the creator’s own drawing style. Used together, creators can significantly reduce drawing time compared to manual methods. And as creators are free-up from some of the labor intensive tasks that go into creating a webcomic, we’re empowering them to spend more time storytelling and creating the rich and unique worlds that readers love.
With AI being increasingly integrated into creative workflows, how does WEBTOON ensure that artists’ intellectual property is protected, especially in the context of AI-generated content?
Protecting creators’ IP is one of our top priorities. Our AI-powered anti-piracy tool, Toon Radar, actively combats unauthorized use of our creators’ work by embedding invisible user identification data into webcomic images to help block illegal uploads. In addition to our AI-powered anti-piracy work on the platform, we also led the charge in fighting piracy in 2024, taking legal action against pirate sites all over the world.
How are WEBTOON’s AI models trained? Are there measures in place to ensure that the AI tools don’t inadvertently use art or content from creators without consent?
This is a great question and really gets to the core of our ethical and Creator-centric approach to innovation. We’ve trained our AI models using data sets that are in the public domain or licensed under creative common licenses. As a matter of company policy, we do not use WEBTOON titles to train our AI models without creator consent. It’s also important to note that we do not sell any user or content data to third parties to train AI models.
How do you see AI evolving in the creative industry? Do you envision AI eventually becoming an indispensable tool for artists, or are there concerns about it reducing the need for human input?
There’s a long history of technology changing how people create. It wasn’t that long ago that comic artists did all of their work on paper pages. But today most artists use some sort of digital sketching tool.
We think about that kind of technological evolution when we’re building new tools. Art and human imaginative creation and storytelling are why we exist as a company. Our founder Junkoo Kim started WEBTOON because he is a passionate lifelong fan of comic art and artists. So anything we do is going to support those things: we’re here to help people make and share incredible art.
But it’s also clear that AI is going to have a major impact on every industry – and how companies approach AI will be seen as a choice between using this technology to diminish or uplift creative communities. While technology may be able to support certain repetitive or time-sensitive tasks, the heart of creation – storytelling, originality, and a webcomic creators’ artists style – will always come from humans. At WEBTOON, our goal is to ensure that we’re investing in AI technology that supports creators, while keeping the creative process firmly in their hands.
With tools like Shaper and Constella reducing drawing time, how does WEBTOON maintain a balance between improving efficiency for artists and preserving the uniqueness of their work?
This is an important issue for us and for all Creative Industries. A comic is an enormous amount of work, and it’s hard to truly understand what goes into a page. A reader sees a few panels, some dialogue, and beautiful images. But all of that takes a lot of time and effort! Coloring is a task unto itself in making comics. That beautiful page exploding with color doesn’t just happen. It’s a long, precise, and deliberate process. If we can help make that process easier for a Creator and reduce time spent, that’s a win.
This is the kind of mindset we bring to all of our innovations. In fact, we are currently experimenting with an AI Painter Tool, that is aimed at reducing coloring time. All of our innovations are about providing tools that can make a creator’s life easier, so it can be easier for artists to make art and tell stories. Shaper and Constella support in similar ways, making creators’ processes easier and reducing how much time they spend on different parts of their storytelling.
In what ways do you believe AI can help artists push the boundaries of their creativity? Can you share examples where AI has already led to unexpected artistic innovations?
That’s really not how we think about AI. Artists already make universes with their work. We host millions of comics on our platform and the creativity I’ve seen is boundless. Creativity doesn’t need AI to help it push boundaries, and we leave art to artists.
But AI and technology can support an artist’s process, and that’s where we can be helpful. If we can help an artist reduce the amount of time they have to spend on a part of their work that feels like work, that’s a great outcome and use case for AI and the approach we’re taking at WEBTOON.
Beyond Shaper and Constella, how do you see AI shaping the future of WEBTOON’s platform and the wider creative industry? Are there any upcoming AI initiatives you can share?
Beyond creator productivity, we know that AI is going to play a big role in the future of content discovery. WEBTOON continues to invest in this area and we recently launched a new version of our AI-powered content recommendation model in Korea, which notably increased user engagement in the months following its release. Higher reader engagement helps artists thrive, receive widespread support, and make a living doing what they love. Using AI to reach interested fans in better ways also helps build fan communities and, potentially, opens doors to other adaptations on Netflix, etc.
With AI continuing to advance, many artists are concerned about being replaced or their work being stolen. How does WEBTOON plan to address these concerns and foster a collaborative relationship between technology and creators?
All over the creative industries, artists are concerned about misuse and theft of their intellectual property. And like TV, film, and other creative industries, as webcomics have grown in popularity, so has piracy online. Webcomics take significant amounts of time and dedication to produce, so it is incredibly disheartening when those materials are stolen at the artist’s expense. We have always been committed to safeguarding artists’ rights, which includes stringent policies and technological solutions – like Toon Radar – that actively combats unauthorized use of our creators’ work.
To foster collaboration, we see AI as a tool for our artists, not a replacement. AI can take on repetitive tasks or help streamline production processes, allowing creators to focus on what truly matters—their unique storytelling and artistic voice. By providing AI tools that assist with tasks like scene generation, colorization, or even interactive content development, we aim to give creators more time to innovate and push the boundaries of their craft.
Ultimately, our goal is to build a future where technology enhances creativity, with creators firmly in control of their artistic vision, and AI as an enabler of new possibilities rather than a threat.
Thank you for the great interview, readers who wish to learn more should visit WEBTOON.
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