My Zen response to all this is “ Stop bothering me with this nonsense and let me have silence, trees and birdsong to continue writing that which means something to me”. Maybe there is still an audience for my heart.
Reportedly John Cage’s 4’33 was “written” in response to the proliferation of Muzak (especially in elevators, where music really drowns out environmental sound). This similarly noisy moment deserves a John Cage.
Thanks Jon, I really appreciate you taking the time to reply with this. I've got The Rest is Noice about 2ft from me so I'll delve into it again, as well as follow your link. Very interesting comment :)
"An audience for my heart" love it! We have to listen to hear God's whispher, don't we? Although I can hear it most adeptly during the dusk, walking in my garden.
There is and as someone raised Buddhist I certainly do. But I think the challenge is the economic model. Economic models always bleed into cultural creation whether it’s church or aristocratic patronage. To me it’s not stressed enough that all popular art in American – from Jazz to cinema – emerged under consumerism. I think right now we’re seeing the ultimate end of the consumer capitalist model’s pursuit of greater profits and efficiency.
I honestly think there is little threat from AI music as I believe that music lovers crave human connection. If AI is appealing to streaming services, I suspect that, as you suggest, streaming services will become a less appealing source of music and be instrumental in their own downfall. I think the appeal of all art is that someone felt something and it caused them to create something in which beauty can be seen. An algorithm cannot do that.
I really hope that people will "come back" to more live performance. I already see that people are craving that so maybe, as you say, streaming services becoming less appealing will lead to that
The threat is that revenue streams will be taken away. Venues need to pay a licence fee to be able to play licensed music, if the cost of licensing an AI to just play 'coldplay sounding stuff' is vastly cheaper, that money gets redirected - so it will hit working muscians and composers in this way
Agreed, the 'song of the summer' is never going to be composition A8174591.3528053 from the AI bot, but that's probably an outlier in the grand scheme of things
And like we're already seeing with authors and visual artists, what are the legal implications of asking an algorithm that's been trained on specific works to spit out copyright free music in the style of someone else, as that is for sure what is going to happen
That's it, exactly. Millions of businesses cutting their dealings with PROs for endless, mindless, royalty-free background/industrial/movie/TV music. One tech company, one-stop shopping, and it'll be one of the giants. I'd think BMI/ASCAP's existence will count on them figuring this out, and life will definitely change for so many musicians/writers...
When I was a kid, I ate Top Ramen daily because I was broke and it was about $0.20 per meal, but then I started making money and moved on to Tuna Melts. 🙂 Haven't had Top Ramen in decades.
I used to listen to cheesy 70's pop when I was a kid because it was on the radio and I knew nothing better. Then I discovered Queen. Good stuff always finds its way to the top.
I agree. I'm subscribed to Spotify, it is great for research purposes (like YouTube music and alike)and a world library at my fingertips, I buy vinyls and I just got a beautiful CD player. I am wondering : if Spotify tells me "go listen to this", will they tell me if it's human or AI generated music?
Ted, but who's the audience for this AI crap? If there is an audience, probably small, should we care? Let these foolish companies go bankrupt pursuing this idiotic obsession, and the rest of us happily discover, support, and listen to real human beings creating real music!
I don't know about that. I think the audience is going to be all of us as we are tortured with this guff in doctors' waiting rooms and just about any other public space where we are forced to wait.
Part of me wonders if music is being pushed underground before it re-emerges again as a strong cultural force. Music journalism has plummeted; the recording industry has collapsed with no obvious saviour in sight; recorded music is frequently just background music for other activities; artists now spend a lot of their time creating music aimed to go viral on social media; album releases are hardly noticed; most big acts are branded individuals not bands; many governments are cutting arts funding and education.
In terms of AI music, as banal as it is I can see a chunk of the population dumbing down to the point where they might even enjoy it, especially if it’s sold as having certain magical powers: increase your concentration; guess the lottery numbers; revitalise your libido. It saves you having to actually learn about culture: just type some key words and there is your custom music.
Despite this I have have hope. Painters responded to the camera by developing entirely new forms of art. AI can’t think conceptually, so human music is likely to become more conceptual. It might give us something to define ourselves and differentiate ourselves against. We’ve been becoming more cyborg for decades - perhaps this will encourage the opposite.
The public develops a preference for digital/flawless drums and a taste for autotune, so why not AI? The salient thing that undercut music is video games...
The recording industry is one thing that I for one don't miss. At all. It was a massive barrier to entry for many many people. That's the irony of this technology. While the expensive elite studios have died, my desktop enables me to do pretty much everything I need except high-end radio-ready mastering, which I'll pay someone else to do - also digitally. The irony.
I don't miss the record labels' dominance, but there are limitations to what can be done with home studios, wonderful as they are. Colin Currie's latest release recorded at Abbey Road Studios demonstrates this - it's sublimely recorded. I would not want these studios to collapse; I think they have great cultural value. Furthermore, music is an ecosystem of musicians, composers, studios, students, teachers, writers, shop owners, programmers, venue owners, DJs etc. The stronger the ecosystem the stronger we all are individually.
"but there are limitations to what can be done with home studios"
Well - mostly no. There is plenty of anything you need out there to do all aspects of your music. The only wall to accomplishing it is the learning of, and applying that learning to your music. It is a pretty steep climb, but just about anyone can do it if they so desire. (well that & the $ required) No need for the gatekeepers anymore.
How would you record Music for 18 Musicians in a home studio, or an orchestra for that matter? Natural acoustics is significant for good recordings. Good mixing desk costs the same as a sports car. Good mics aren’t much cheaper. By the time someone owns all this they basically have a pro-studio. You can do great stuff in home studios, but they aren’t the same.
I don't believe that the problem is they may enjoy it. It is that so many won't bother to see if that's what it is / where it came from. Very easy problem to fix if people would care.
I will add that this afternoon I’m heading to perform at a community event, “Music in the Park”, in Seattle, where we’ll play original songs for a crowd on the lawn. We’ll sing, talk, smile, laugh, story and see one another. True human connection without AI additives. It is still out there.
You're right. I recall seeing policy statements on that. There is however, a likelihood that the USPTO and the the US Copyright Office will be challenged in court over machine generated content
I see from Ken's post below that it would be difficult to identify the creator. It was something that popped into my head when I read the column. I will defer to other's judgment on this as I am not a copyright expert at all.
I’m not an expert re copyright either. There are chord progressions, however, on which many songs are written. One example is the 1-6-4-5. It’s commonly referred to as the “Heart and Soul” progression as that song is built specifically thereon. Many, many songs, are individually copyrighted with that exact chord progression. No one has the corner on that chord series as well as many others.
That's pretty much been done by real artists. Not to worry... The recent Ed Sheeran case was helpful in this regard. Lyrics are more brief, compared to say a novel, so there might be a concern on lyrical overlap.
The concept of fair use, on the other hand, is getting stretched by data prompted statistical content generation. No person can do what Mubert's program did. So, the very idea that Mubert's program "legally" listened to the music it used to train is dodgy. I'm sure this will all be tested in court.
To Gioia's larger point, people sorting through all the dross to find worthwhile artists is a constituency, and the companies flooding the field with crap might find themselves on the wrong side of the money.
Also, I agree with you in general, the "real" artist might have a bit of trouble in a world flooded with copyrighted statistically generated songs. And I am also watching how the courts treat that kind of content. Can it be copyrighted? Who are the authors, the training data composers?
If the Sheeran/Heirs of Marvin Gaye decision holds up on appeal, chord progressions will not be subject to copyright. Otherwise we’ll all just be paying each other.
In a scant few generations, artistic excellence will be but a quaint romantic notion. We dinosaurs will fade from the earth carrying our vivid memories of those who enriched our lives with artistic expression born of intellect, passion, and humanity. The 21st Century has, thus far, been all about devaluing humanity, celebrating greed and monetizing fear. All mankind's worst impulses now have sophisticated tools at their disposal. It's timely that Oppenheimer opens next week. We're really good at creating powerful things to destroy, but not so good at creating things of enduring great beauty and service to humanity.
Eloquently put, although I do disagree with the pessimism part (about us dinosaurs fading away). I actually find that the 21st Century, as brutal as it has been thus far, has been a never ending source of dystopian inspiration for my novel and songwriting, so much so I don't have enough years left to put all of my ideas to songs and words, though I'll certainly try. I'm sure there are many others. We've been basically buried in a deep compost pit. Some sort of beautiful flowers and plants are bound to grow out of it.
Out of morbid curiosity, I downloaded the Mubert app so I could listen to some of these tracks. They are exactly as terrible and pointless as the nay-sayers have noted, posessing not even a real melody, or even a vague understanding of tension-and-release that cookie cutter electronic genres like ambient utilize. It really is just a crap generator at this point.
I’ve been adding this to my disclaimer section lately:
“Note: I do not use any form of “Artificial Intelligence” in writing Michael Acoustic. It is possible that some external sources that I link to or quote do use or contain AI generated material.”
Interesting point about video games. They are such big business that real creativity goes into them. The big titles' creative teams are large and skilled. Writers, artists, and yes composers get paid real money to do serious work. People don't just expect great graphics - they want great games with all the bells and whistles. Competition is fierce; profits are enormous; why NOT spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on the music?
Everything's going to collapse soon. Maybe we'll need musicians to be the shamans again, the leader of the tribe with the nicest tent.
Anyone living in Dubai who wasn't born in the Gulf is, for the most part, a parasite. It's all about the money.
Ted doesn't write about health care. It's really bad. The money's being sucked out by all the middlemen, utterly predictable with the Medical-Industrial Complex. The quality of the doctors is abysmal. The older ones are mostly completely burnt out. The younger ones never would have been admitted forty years ago. This after decades of warnings about looming shortages everywhere, from nurses to primary care doctors, and now every specialty under the sun.
Haven't even mentioned climate change.
I don't know about cat guts and stuff, but it seems like soon the folks who know how to make strings out of nature will be in demand soon.
are you talking about Dubai or the US with that healthcare comment? Med school admissions in the US has gotten massively more competitive than it was fourth years ago, and almost no old doctors would have been able to get in today. Current med students and residents tend to be a fair bit smarter. that’s not all that matters to being a good doctor, of course. apologies if this wasn’t about the US, though I think many places in the world are similar
that's absolutely incorrect, many articles have been written about the phenomenon. unfortunately many of the best and brightest follow the money. that's not in medicine anymore. finance, law, MBAs. everyone wants to be an entrepreneur. then those who still might consider medicine read about getting squeezed between insurance companies, hedge funds buying out hospitals and medical practices, the grief with electronic medical records.
my nephew just graduated from Michigan. he and his friends did really well, all smart kids. none of them are headed to medical school. in the suburb where he's from, where I grew up, half the smart kids became doctors. also don't be fooled by admission rates and other stats like number of med school positions not keeping up with the population growth. basically, nobody wants the aggravation and who can blame them? physicians are employees now, evaluated by evermore bureaucrats for efficiency and being team players. read about the ones that got fired for daring to speak up when hospitals weren't prepared to deal with COVID? PR and money people run healthcare now.
Not in every country. My recent cataract surgery, in Thailand, cost 1/2 of the what it costs in the US, and if I wanted to go to a govt. sponsored hospital, it would have cost 1/2 of that. I didn't go to govt. hospital because, like most things run by the govt. it's inefficient and chaotic.
Like someone else mentioned re: social media sites, when a platform or an industry becomes inundated with crap, people leave and go somewhere else.
I, for one, can hardly stand Facebook. I just keep it for my band page. I don't peruse any main stream media; I mostly follow substackers like Ted. I am a rock and metal guy to the core, but I can't stand rock radio any more because all the labels and stations play is the same stuff from the 60s and 70s and new stuff that sounds like the old stuff. I'm Who'd and Zeppelin'd out, but apparently that's their formula and they seem to be sticking to it. I was briefly on Spotify back in 2013, but left shortly after because I felt almost like an addict, like music wasn't as valuable suddenly. I pulled my small catalog from all streaming sites.
All this to say that I'm taking everyone's word for it that the AI stuff is crap. I'm not even bothering to listen. [UPDATE: OK, curiosity got the best of me and I went to Mubert... listened to the first track that looked interesting and laughed out loud, and only lasted about 5 seconds.] I can imagine that these programmers have some delusion that they'll make royalties from generating so much content, but I'd bet they are in for a rude awakening.
Yesterday, I saw a comment from another substack mentioning an old Mike & The Mechanics song "The Living Years". I couldn't remember the song very well, so I went back and listened. I ended up crying like a kid again at the memory of the loss of my father. Sorry, AI might be able to mimic, but it'll never write what a human with a life of experiences with heart and emotions can.
These techies can flood the zone all they want, but it’s not going to work.
One small thing I decided to do is place a barred-circle NO AI watermark on any video I create for YouTube or any other digital ‘venue’ supporting the music I create. (Four videos so far.) It’s done in such a way that it doesn’t distract from the video content; it just appears at top left for the first ten seconds or so. We need to fight this horror however we can
"Quit bragging about your 100 million tracks. Just pick the best two or three, and let us listen to them—and make up our minds."
It's insane. Nobody asked for 100 million "songs" written by anyone or anything. I can't imagine anyone thinks this is a wonderful development. I have a few years left to listen to my favorite music and to prioritize some new discoveries along the way. THAT'S exciting - it's something to live for.
People in old-school advertising and marketing seem very wise all of a sudden. To the best of my knowledge nobody made a fortune (or gained a cult following) by saying "my product costs nothing, it's worth nothing, it's ubiquitous, it's derivative in the least interesting way possible. We're replacing what you like with it and you'll have no choice but to consume it. You're welcome!"
My Zen response to all this is “ Stop bothering me with this nonsense and let me have silence, trees and birdsong to continue writing that which means something to me”. Maybe there is still an audience for my heart.
Reportedly John Cage’s 4’33 was “written” in response to the proliferation of Muzak (especially in elevators, where music really drowns out environmental sound). This similarly noisy moment deserves a John Cage.
I was not aware of that. You don’t happen to have a source for that do you?
A quote here references the connection, from when the piece was going to be called “Silent Prayer”. Obviously there’s a lot more to 4’33, but Muzak’s pervasiveness seems to have gotten the Zen juices flowing. https://rosewhitemusic.com/piano/writings/five-statements-on-silence-by-john-cage/
I believe Alex Ross’s book also goes into this.
Thanks Jon, I really appreciate you taking the time to reply with this. I've got The Rest is Noice about 2ft from me so I'll delve into it again, as well as follow your link. Very interesting comment :)
There is.
"An audience for my heart" love it! We have to listen to hear God's whispher, don't we? Although I can hear it most adeptly during the dusk, walking in my garden.
On the other hand, greed may be unstoppable.
https://twitter.com/JustineBateman/status/1657476895972413440
Greed has always been unstoppable, that's why the world is in the condition that it's in today.
There is and as someone raised Buddhist I certainly do. But I think the challenge is the economic model. Economic models always bleed into cultural creation whether it’s church or aristocratic patronage. To me it’s not stressed enough that all popular art in American – from Jazz to cinema – emerged under consumerism. I think right now we’re seeing the ultimate end of the consumer capitalist model’s pursuit of greater profits and efficiency.
I honestly think there is little threat from AI music as I believe that music lovers crave human connection. If AI is appealing to streaming services, I suspect that, as you suggest, streaming services will become a less appealing source of music and be instrumental in their own downfall. I think the appeal of all art is that someone felt something and it caused them to create something in which beauty can be seen. An algorithm cannot do that.
I really hope that people will "come back" to more live performance. I already see that people are craving that so maybe, as you say, streaming services becoming less appealing will lead to that
The threat is that revenue streams will be taken away. Venues need to pay a licence fee to be able to play licensed music, if the cost of licensing an AI to just play 'coldplay sounding stuff' is vastly cheaper, that money gets redirected - so it will hit working muscians and composers in this way
Agreed, the 'song of the summer' is never going to be composition A8174591.3528053 from the AI bot, but that's probably an outlier in the grand scheme of things
And like we're already seeing with authors and visual artists, what are the legal implications of asking an algorithm that's been trained on specific works to spit out copyright free music in the style of someone else, as that is for sure what is going to happen
That's it, exactly. Millions of businesses cutting their dealings with PROs for endless, mindless, royalty-free background/industrial/movie/TV music. One tech company, one-stop shopping, and it'll be one of the giants. I'd think BMI/ASCAP's existence will count on them figuring this out, and life will definitely change for so many musicians/writers...
Those who are preteens and don't know the difference, will be the driving force for acceptance of AI music, art, everything.
When I was a kid, I ate Top Ramen daily because I was broke and it was about $0.20 per meal, but then I started making money and moved on to Tuna Melts. 🙂 Haven't had Top Ramen in decades.
I used to listen to cheesy 70's pop when I was a kid because it was on the radio and I knew nothing better. Then I discovered Queen. Good stuff always finds its way to the top.
Good stuff (whatever that means) may find it's way to the top, the question is, do people find their way to the top?
You’ve found your way, and I’m thankful for that 🙂
I agree, but I certainly don’t ‘like’. The shifting paradigm of human spiritual development is in a death spiral.
That’s actually a very good point. I hope you’re wrong.
there's always going to be a force pushing back from the Luddites...thankfully
Sure hope you're right.
So true.
I agree. I'm subscribed to Spotify, it is great for research purposes (like YouTube music and alike)and a world library at my fingertips, I buy vinyls and I just got a beautiful CD player. I am wondering : if Spotify tells me "go listen to this", will they tell me if it's human or AI generated music?
I think not!
I totally agree. What is the point of listening to AI generated music?
Well said. Admiration- even envy- is a component of music appreciation.
Ted, but who's the audience for this AI crap? If there is an audience, probably small, should we care? Let these foolish companies go bankrupt pursuing this idiotic obsession, and the rest of us happily discover, support, and listen to real human beings creating real music!
The audience is the preteens, who don't know the difference between live and AI.
I don't know about that. I think the audience is going to be all of us as we are tortured with this guff in doctors' waiting rooms and just about any other public space where we are forced to wait.
Yep, that’s the thing that worries me
Good point.
Part of me wonders if music is being pushed underground before it re-emerges again as a strong cultural force. Music journalism has plummeted; the recording industry has collapsed with no obvious saviour in sight; recorded music is frequently just background music for other activities; artists now spend a lot of their time creating music aimed to go viral on social media; album releases are hardly noticed; most big acts are branded individuals not bands; many governments are cutting arts funding and education.
In terms of AI music, as banal as it is I can see a chunk of the population dumbing down to the point where they might even enjoy it, especially if it’s sold as having certain magical powers: increase your concentration; guess the lottery numbers; revitalise your libido. It saves you having to actually learn about culture: just type some key words and there is your custom music.
Despite this I have have hope. Painters responded to the camera by developing entirely new forms of art. AI can’t think conceptually, so human music is likely to become more conceptual. It might give us something to define ourselves and differentiate ourselves against. We’ve been becoming more cyborg for decades - perhaps this will encourage the opposite.
"Painters responded to the camera by developing entirely new forms of art."
Incredibly relevant point, and it gives me some hope.
The public develops a preference for digital/flawless drums and a taste for autotune, so why not AI? The salient thing that undercut music is video games...
The recording industry is one thing that I for one don't miss. At all. It was a massive barrier to entry for many many people. That's the irony of this technology. While the expensive elite studios have died, my desktop enables me to do pretty much everything I need except high-end radio-ready mastering, which I'll pay someone else to do - also digitally. The irony.
I don't miss the record labels' dominance, but there are limitations to what can be done with home studios, wonderful as they are. Colin Currie's latest release recorded at Abbey Road Studios demonstrates this - it's sublimely recorded. I would not want these studios to collapse; I think they have great cultural value. Furthermore, music is an ecosystem of musicians, composers, studios, students, teachers, writers, shop owners, programmers, venue owners, DJs etc. The stronger the ecosystem the stronger we all are individually.
"but there are limitations to what can be done with home studios"
Well - mostly no. There is plenty of anything you need out there to do all aspects of your music. The only wall to accomplishing it is the learning of, and applying that learning to your music. It is a pretty steep climb, but just about anyone can do it if they so desire. (well that & the $ required) No need for the gatekeepers anymore.
How would you record Music for 18 Musicians in a home studio, or an orchestra for that matter? Natural acoustics is significant for good recordings. Good mixing desk costs the same as a sports car. Good mics aren’t much cheaper. By the time someone owns all this they basically have a pro-studio. You can do great stuff in home studios, but they aren’t the same.
This is the way. Make AI little but Pop Rocks all the way down
I don't believe that the problem is they may enjoy it. It is that so many won't bother to see if that's what it is / where it came from. Very easy problem to fix if people would care.
I will add that this afternoon I’m heading to perform at a community event, “Music in the Park”, in Seattle, where we’ll play original songs for a crowd on the lawn. We’ll sing, talk, smile, laugh, story and see one another. True human connection without AI additives. It is still out there.
Sounds great. Wish I could go, but I live a bit far away. Australia.
You can support the local artists by attending their performances.
Already do.
Here's a little sample... :) https://youtu.be/SRN8rucQ94o
My fear is that they will generate all possible chord progressions and then sue anyone with new music that matches them.
I may be mistaken but I believe the copyright office is saying that AI-generated music doesn’t qualify for copyright protection.
Good!
I had the same though. How could AI legally obtain use when all AI does is data mine other people's content?
You're right. I recall seeing policy statements on that. There is however, a likelihood that the USPTO and the the US Copyright Office will be challenged in court over machine generated content
Chord progressions cannot be copyrighted...
I see from Ken's post below that it would be difficult to identify the creator. It was something that popped into my head when I read the column. I will defer to other's judgment on this as I am not a copyright expert at all.
I’m not an expert re copyright either. There are chord progressions, however, on which many songs are written. One example is the 1-6-4-5. It’s commonly referred to as the “Heart and Soul” progression as that song is built specifically thereon. Many, many songs, are individually copyrighted with that exact chord progression. No one has the corner on that chord series as well as many others.
Which genre is based entirely on the I-IV-V? You get one guess :D
The copyright cat was truly let out of the bag on THAT one :)
I don’t understand…
What is the Blues?
That's pretty much been done by real artists. Not to worry... The recent Ed Sheeran case was helpful in this regard. Lyrics are more brief, compared to say a novel, so there might be a concern on lyrical overlap.
The concept of fair use, on the other hand, is getting stretched by data prompted statistical content generation. No person can do what Mubert's program did. So, the very idea that Mubert's program "legally" listened to the music it used to train is dodgy. I'm sure this will all be tested in court.
To Gioia's larger point, people sorting through all the dross to find worthwhile artists is a constituency, and the companies flooding the field with crap might find themselves on the wrong side of the money.
Also, I agree with you in general, the "real" artist might have a bit of trouble in a world flooded with copyrighted statistically generated songs. And I am also watching how the courts treat that kind of content. Can it be copyrighted? Who are the authors, the training data composers?
But you can't copyright a chord progression--only a melody. Though maybe AI could generate all possible melodies!
Oh my god, I hadn't even thought of that, Terry. Arrgh.
If the Sheeran/Heirs of Marvin Gaye decision holds up on appeal, chord progressions will not be subject to copyright. Otherwise we’ll all just be paying each other.
In a scant few generations, artistic excellence will be but a quaint romantic notion. We dinosaurs will fade from the earth carrying our vivid memories of those who enriched our lives with artistic expression born of intellect, passion, and humanity. The 21st Century has, thus far, been all about devaluing humanity, celebrating greed and monetizing fear. All mankind's worst impulses now have sophisticated tools at their disposal. It's timely that Oppenheimer opens next week. We're really good at creating powerful things to destroy, but not so good at creating things of enduring great beauty and service to humanity.
Eloquently put, although I do disagree with the pessimism part (about us dinosaurs fading away). I actually find that the 21st Century, as brutal as it has been thus far, has been a never ending source of dystopian inspiration for my novel and songwriting, so much so I don't have enough years left to put all of my ideas to songs and words, though I'll certainly try. I'm sure there are many others. We've been basically buried in a deep compost pit. Some sort of beautiful flowers and plants are bound to grow out of it.
Out of morbid curiosity, I downloaded the Mubert app so I could listen to some of these tracks. They are exactly as terrible and pointless as the nay-sayers have noted, posessing not even a real melody, or even a vague understanding of tension-and-release that cookie cutter electronic genres like ambient utilize. It really is just a crap generator at this point.
Good to hear. It doesn't mean that supermarkets and elevator companies won't jump on it if it's cheap enough..
I’ve been adding this to my disclaimer section lately:
“Note: I do not use any form of “Artificial Intelligence” in writing Michael Acoustic. It is possible that some external sources that I link to or quote do use or contain AI generated material.”
Call me a Luddite and come at me, Big AI!
Hi Michael
More disclaimers (I went through my food cupboard)
This music may contain traces of AI.
This music is 99% AI free.
This music is made from 99% human ingredients.
These are great!!
Hope this makes everyone feel better. We keep listening to our favorite no AI artists.
I do hope music has better chances than visual artists.
Let’s hope that writing has a better chance too.
AI is a lot of quantity and no quality.
Which is actually perfect for creatives, to really make art that stands out from this infinite noise of similar pattern.
I can’t imagine playing a videogame made by an AI, it must be like living through hell or being stuck in a nightmare.
This applies to all AI “art” and honestly I believe music is the shittiest (maybe because I am a musician)
Interesting point about video games. They are such big business that real creativity goes into them. The big titles' creative teams are large and skilled. Writers, artists, and yes composers get paid real money to do serious work. People don't just expect great graphics - they want great games with all the bells and whistles. Competition is fierce; profits are enormous; why NOT spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on the music?
Had to chuckle at "videogame." The last one I played was either Space Invaders or Pac Man on my Atari in 1981.
Video games still don't right to me. Always in that "uncanny valley"
Everything's going to collapse soon. Maybe we'll need musicians to be the shamans again, the leader of the tribe with the nicest tent.
Anyone living in Dubai who wasn't born in the Gulf is, for the most part, a parasite. It's all about the money.
Ted doesn't write about health care. It's really bad. The money's being sucked out by all the middlemen, utterly predictable with the Medical-Industrial Complex. The quality of the doctors is abysmal. The older ones are mostly completely burnt out. The younger ones never would have been admitted forty years ago. This after decades of warnings about looming shortages everywhere, from nurses to primary care doctors, and now every specialty under the sun.
Haven't even mentioned climate change.
I don't know about cat guts and stuff, but it seems like soon the folks who know how to make strings out of nature will be in demand soon.
I think the best musicians are indeed shamans. They're the only shamans we've got, really.
are you talking about Dubai or the US with that healthcare comment? Med school admissions in the US has gotten massively more competitive than it was fourth years ago, and almost no old doctors would have been able to get in today. Current med students and residents tend to be a fair bit smarter. that’s not all that matters to being a good doctor, of course. apologies if this wasn’t about the US, though I think many places in the world are similar
that's absolutely incorrect, many articles have been written about the phenomenon. unfortunately many of the best and brightest follow the money. that's not in medicine anymore. finance, law, MBAs. everyone wants to be an entrepreneur. then those who still might consider medicine read about getting squeezed between insurance companies, hedge funds buying out hospitals and medical practices, the grief with electronic medical records.
my nephew just graduated from Michigan. he and his friends did really well, all smart kids. none of them are headed to medical school. in the suburb where he's from, where I grew up, half the smart kids became doctors. also don't be fooled by admission rates and other stats like number of med school positions not keeping up with the population growth. basically, nobody wants the aggravation and who can blame them? physicians are employees now, evaluated by evermore bureaucrats for efficiency and being team players. read about the ones that got fired for daring to speak up when hospitals weren't prepared to deal with COVID? PR and money people run healthcare now.
Not in every country. My recent cataract surgery, in Thailand, cost 1/2 of the what it costs in the US, and if I wanted to go to a govt. sponsored hospital, it would have cost 1/2 of that. I didn't go to govt. hospital because, like most things run by the govt. it's inefficient and chaotic.
This makes me want to purposefully cry human tears.
Like someone else mentioned re: social media sites, when a platform or an industry becomes inundated with crap, people leave and go somewhere else.
I, for one, can hardly stand Facebook. I just keep it for my band page. I don't peruse any main stream media; I mostly follow substackers like Ted. I am a rock and metal guy to the core, but I can't stand rock radio any more because all the labels and stations play is the same stuff from the 60s and 70s and new stuff that sounds like the old stuff. I'm Who'd and Zeppelin'd out, but apparently that's their formula and they seem to be sticking to it. I was briefly on Spotify back in 2013, but left shortly after because I felt almost like an addict, like music wasn't as valuable suddenly. I pulled my small catalog from all streaming sites.
All this to say that I'm taking everyone's word for it that the AI stuff is crap. I'm not even bothering to listen. [UPDATE: OK, curiosity got the best of me and I went to Mubert... listened to the first track that looked interesting and laughed out loud, and only lasted about 5 seconds.] I can imagine that these programmers have some delusion that they'll make royalties from generating so much content, but I'd bet they are in for a rude awakening.
Yesterday, I saw a comment from another substack mentioning an old Mike & The Mechanics song "The Living Years". I couldn't remember the song very well, so I went back and listened. I ended up crying like a kid again at the memory of the loss of my father. Sorry, AI might be able to mimic, but it'll never write what a human with a life of experiences with heart and emotions can.
These techies can flood the zone all they want, but it’s not going to work.
One small thing I decided to do is place a barred-circle NO AI watermark on any video I create for YouTube or any other digital ‘venue’ supporting the music I create. (Four videos so far.) It’s done in such a way that it doesn’t distract from the video content; it just appears at top left for the first ten seconds or so. We need to fight this horror however we can
"Quit bragging about your 100 million tracks. Just pick the best two or three, and let us listen to them—and make up our minds."
It's insane. Nobody asked for 100 million "songs" written by anyone or anything. I can't imagine anyone thinks this is a wonderful development. I have a few years left to listen to my favorite music and to prioritize some new discoveries along the way. THAT'S exciting - it's something to live for.
People in old-school advertising and marketing seem very wise all of a sudden. To the best of my knowledge nobody made a fortune (or gained a cult following) by saying "my product costs nothing, it's worth nothing, it's ubiquitous, it's derivative in the least interesting way possible. We're replacing what you like with it and you'll have no choice but to consume it. You're welcome!"