It's intended use was misinformation but perhaps not in the way you imagine.
Rather than producing credible images, these sorts of projects undermine actual credible images.
For example, if you're team zion, then when shown images of how devastating Israel's attack on Gaza has been you can just disregard them as "probably fake".
"Oh pish posh, a child can create these images on google maps".
I'm not necessarily suggesting Doctorow is correct with this assertion, but on a macro scale what productivity gains will generate AI provide?
Yes there's a few skills it's good at coding, medical research, and image recognition being a few.
The genuine question is: has this improved everyone's quality of life?