Publishing media directly to relays creates a risk for the relay operator.

As they function now they only hold text events. If they held media as well they would be responsible for any illegal content on their servers, which could be placed there organically or by an attacker.

To me the risk is higher than the reward and would require anyone who wants to view that media to use that specific relay. 

 Yes that makes sense. I've actually come across some legally questionable AI images on nostr before and was wondering why a relay would host it. But if the note itself has only text, then it makes sense and the liability falls on the server of the image. Right? 

 As I understand it yes, which will get tricky for image hosting, but I suppose an AI checker will be able to stop a majority of the bad stuff.