How AI might make a lot of musicians irrelevant

Howdy! Today it's time to have the talk I've feared most - AI and it's impact on the creative landscape for middle-class creators.
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[@VenusTheory]

Edit: RIP my inbox as an 'AI Sympathizer' apparently.. Perhaps a video on the ethics of AI is in order next? 🤔 ▼▼▼$upport the channel (and more videos like this)▼▼▼ Become a Patron ► venustheory.com/buckaroonie-babez Samples and Presets ► venustheory.com/store My Awesome Partners: 🔊 Free To Use Sounds ► bit.ly/3kIpeTz (save $5 with code: venustheory5) 💿 DistroKid (Save 7%) ► distrokid.com/vip/venustheory 🎛 PSP Audioware ► bit.ly/3yqABa7 (save 10% with code: venustheory) 🎼 Hooktheory! ► hooktheory.com/affiliate/209.html 🎶 Bitwig ► bit.ly/2S3cqvP 💙 Kilohearts ► bit.ly/2S7dZZP 🌌 Luftrum Sounds ► bit.ly/3CzJvmL 🎸 Bandzoogle ► bandzoogle.com/?pc=venustheory 💻 Plugin Boutique ► bit.ly/3IfHldl ☁ Loopcloud ► bit.ly/3IUItTn 🟧 Reason Studios ► bit.ly/2RUqSWK 🎹 Perfect Circuit ► bit.ly/3NJmL7k 🕺 Cableguys ► bit.ly/2T4Or0a 🌊 Waves Plugins ► bit.ly/3yHTMJX 🔊 ADSR Sounds ► bit.ly/3e5xCcD --- If you make a purchase using any of the affiliate links, I earn a small commission with no extra cost to you. This is a great way to get cool new stuff, and support the channel so I can make more videos like this one! I only promote products and services that I love myself, and I'm sure you'll love them too! I appreciate it! 😁

[@fivefouronly]

@@robp775 I completely agree with this. We're seeing the buggy whip manufacturers bemoaning the fact that buggies are going out of style. Yes, we will not need so many buggy whips in the future, that's how progress progresses. Time to find another, hopefully related, occupation, possibly still in the transportation game, though. I mean, I get it, it sucks to be a buggy whip manufacturer and watch those stupid horseless things running around noisily stinking everything up. God they're awful, always breaking down or hitting things. I totally get it. But... what can anyone do? The Luddite thing never really works, and these "automobiles" seem like the direction things are probably heading. We can complain, or we can start buying gasoline. Or maybe both, I guess, but I'd get used to the' buying gasoline instead of hay' thing. It's a new century.

[@clymdodds1020]

Sisters of mercy sacked their drummer and hired Dr Avalanche and it was a glorified programmable drum machine(and that was the 90's) Is it as versatile as a human or adaptable? Nope! got the job done though. What I'm failing to say here is; it's not like this hasn't been a long time coming boss.

[@TOEC]

A video on the ethics of AI would likely be a waste of time. You can't educate someone who wants to be right.

[@bjornbirk]

Lol at “AI sympathizer” 😂 humans will be humans - weirdly enough, always both super fast and super slow to adapt.

[@zenko4187]

Yeah....noticed that artists are pretty sensitive about this topic, but I like how you came at it from an economics perspective. Ethics in AI is a very nuanced discussion as well, so I'm curious how you approach it. For those of us that are working on refining these Ai workflows and models, we do sometimes take into consideration ethical standards in gathering and representing training data. (Not using artists name within the training set, using descriptive language as an anchor for style, removing examples that would overfit on a specific source, etc). Still, like all technology, not everyone will be so ethically inclined in its use.

[@Mancheguache]

The drum machine in my AI band had a massive fall-out with the guitar simulator and the keyboard melody generator is in rehab

[@avsync-live]

Sounds like a fun concept album

[@bdhanes]

This needs more thumbs up. LOL😂

[@NoirArt.]

why did this remind me of the Destruction mv from Joywave

[@scratchy996]

I let my AI play CoD, now it has PTSD and only writes dark, nihilistic songs.

[@johnplacca17]

Lmao

[@toslinked]

well, you know. I’ve been a professional musician for almost 30 years now. whenever I feel really bad, I pick up an instrument and sing to it. nothing makes me feel more alive and grounded. AI will never take that from me, and that’s good enough.

[@wakegary]

This guy's a robot! Get him!

[@lechemediastudios]

@@wakegary haha... it's interesting how a smart, logical argument could now very easily be computer-generated. Personally, I refuse to believe that a true emotional connection can come from AI.

[@scratchy996]

​@@lechemediastudios You should try chatGPT and see the letter it writes. People have been brought to tears after reading Ai generated letters. After all, our mind works based on algorithms, and an "emotional connection" is just code that makes our brain respond by releasing certain chemicals.

[@santiagocaruso9051]

Yes, but AI catching up all the work, would leave us playing only at home as a hobby.

[@RenatoSantos-in2qz]

Don't worry, there is not feeling in the stuff generated by ai. I am a brazilian songwriter and I listen to songs from nowhere since I was child. Although I play strings, I don"t need guitar to compose, and I don't have own style, always creating new things......samba, reggae, frevo, bolero, xote, xaxado and so on. Will be hard ai to find my style. Each song is unique.

[@amarug]

As an engineer I always thought I knew where this was headed and envisioned a near-ish future where workers in factories, burgerking and mcdonalds are completely replaced by robots. Ironically I have worked in computer vision and machine learning myself, yet I did not see this coming. What I have seen and heard in the past months made me extremely depressed. I had no idea that artists of all things were headed to the chopping block. And I am technically on the "tech side" yet it breaks my heart - I can't imagine how some artists must feel. We have created it and there is no way of undoing it.

[@roger4845]

Sad times. So many people in the comments justifying destroying peoples lifes for their own convenience. Thank you

[@GeoffBournes]

As someone who has come to a point where im finally focused on making original music regardless of outcome , i dont feel threatened by A.I since its PEOPLE who have created this scenario in the first place by pushing and encouraging mediocrity . i have come to expect very little from Joe Public tbh. If A.I can do it better and put out something i actually like , so be it. I am still gonna do ME because i am my own best investment at this point.

[@NoirArt.]

As someone in a big and diverse art community, I can tell you that a lot of them started doing art as a relief, as an escape, as their personal therapy. Sometimes they struggled, but they started growing into confident, happy people that found their place in the world. It _absolutely terrifies_ me to just think about how this debate will affect a lot of people like them, especially when I see the astonishing backlash everyone that defends real art has to face on social media right now - it's brutal, those people want to see blood

[@Sanctum1972]

@@roger4845 The problem is with the AI devs letting the common people get away with abusing the system and justifying its existence for their convenience as frauds or 'armchair experts'. The solution is to get legislation to crack down on the developers that made the AI apps to crack down on their users with guard rails. It's not meant to replace artists of all kinds. That fault lies on the AI venture capitalists and the users who cross the line.

[@TheLunarnotes]

@@Sanctum1972 yes, absolutely this. It needs to happen

[@Cyberdemon1542]

"Create something worth imitating" If you do that, your work will just be fuel for the AI.

[@RenatoSantos-in2qz]

Really

[@typhoon320i]

@Lessko Brandon If one wants to make art, because one enjoys it, than do it. If one is relying on a revenue stream, ....make other plans.

[@arisumego]

@@lesskobrandonthat's what I've been doing for a long while now and I would not fucking recommend it to anyone. im finding it more and more difficult to even sing a note or compose a melody anymore. even listening to music is getting harder

[@robertjamesonmusic]

@@typhoon320i Right? Like artists make jack shit already. Just use it to push your art so far and incorporate it back into an incredible live show where people will actually have something to pay to see

[@TOEC]

The only reason AI will result in musicians and artists being made irrelevant is because the general public (the audiance/customers) have reached an absolutely absurd level of apathy for quality. For example, when they look at an Opal gemstone ring, they don't care if it's genuine or not, as long as it *looks* genuine. They don't care if art is genuine, as long as it *looks* genuine. They don't care if music is written by an actual human, as long as it sounds like it was. There are thousands of hours of video on youtube about understanding why great music is great, and why great artwork is great, but *knowing* the reasons, understanding the things that make a great creative piece, has become a niche market. AI causing a lot of creative people to lose their jobs is actually not so much the fault of AI, as it is people, on average, being very shallow.

[@ghostknight1865]

Underrated comment. You're partly right, the audience has been training to focus on quantity, not quality, so whatever produces faster will win.

[@nervoussuffermaker]

The real reason is actually the absurd level of apathy for people doing the creative work. Quality is arbitrary. And there are a lot of other things about art that makes it valuable. But as long as it seen as a product to be monetized and/or mindlessly consume (not talking about being shallow here as its irrelevant here, but being conditioned for fast consumption with which you just can't be mindful) with no regard to people creating it, those people will always be a nuisance to be optimized out of the process.

[@MrFram]

Arguably, a lot of that quality was never there. Everything is too repetitive, too samey. And "original" stuff is just "omg so quirky”, not truly sending an insightful message, or sharing an emotion. Sure, many artists put emotion and passion into their work, but how much of it makes it through to the listeners? Sometimes I see some artwork or hear some music and feel impressed by it, but this is rare, most of what you find is just aesthetic noise. I was talking to ChatGPT the other day, and while it seemed impressive at first, I quickly found out it’s not much better than your generic internet intellectual. Sure, it knows a lot of stuff, but if you’re terminally online like me, you’ve heard all of it before, I have yet to learn any new information from it, or hear a single original thought. It doesn’t pass my turing test, but neither does the average user who swallows and then vomits out the same takes from the same handful of influential figures. Sturgeon's law states that "90% of everything is crap", and now the 90% are panicking that AI can be mediocre too.

[@pokepress]

Having observed some of the problems you described, I think the problem is less consumers not caring about what goes into art, but the fact that they spend considerably more time consuming art itself than meta content around it. Once the ratio becomes wide enough, the recommendation AI starts treating the meta content as not worthwhile, perpetuating the cycle. It’s similar to how social media emphasizes content that produces engagement, even if it’s not the kind of content that users actually get value from.

[@1itemorless]

@@MrFram Or maybe you just haven't seen the quality stuff, because the shit stuff is what sells so that's what people make to make a living.

[@kpsiegel]

I don't earn a living making music. I make music because it is something that makes me feel like a more complete and connected person and is essential for me to live a fulfilled life. AI has no place for me given that is my purpose for my music. In different circumstances I could definitely see the use. I suspect I am just like a lot of people that way. Keep on making your great content Cameron. AI is training itself on you right now 🙂

[@VenusTheory]

Great way to think of it I think. End of the day, everything is optional and if it serves your purposes then great. If not, whatever haha. And thanks so much! More on the way soon, hopefully these types of videos stick as I love making them.

[@xyhmo]

That's the artist cliché that many say, but people tend to care more about social aspects than they realize, including even completely ridiculous and banal things like ”likes”. And the social value and status of being a songwriter will drop towards zero when any village idiot can create a masterpiece at the push of a button. I get that there are semi-autistic people who truly don't care and just want to do their thing, but many artists will def feel and care about the drop in status. You show your latest piece to your family, which you've been working on for three weeks, and then your five year old brothers kid create a better song by pushing a button in an app. For most people that means something.

[@thefrozensea9314]

@@xyhmo true. I agree with kpsiegel though that I'll continue to create even if what you say comes true. For me it partly depends on me simply loving my own music. Even though Beethoven would classify as "objectively better" I guess, I still prefer to listen to my own music. I'm sure that would apply to whatever that future 5-year old comes up with 😅

[@xyhmo]

@@thefrozensea9314 I'd like to think I will continue making music as well, esp since I already have the skills anyway, and I enjoy both the result and the process. But still, I think ai music in general takes something away. It's not binary, it's not suddently completely pointless to make music, but maybe it will remove on average 20% of the joy or something. Who knows the exact number, but I think many will experience that something is lost. As for enjoying your own music, there's no reason why the ai can't learn your taste (by analyzing your playlists or whatever) and create music even better suited to your taste than what you're able to create yourself - and certainly more surprising. ”Pushing a button” is fun metaphor, but in practice the music could and will be shaped by a whole bunch of factors, including playlists and directly changing settings and perhaps assigning scores and judgements to earlier ai creations etc - over time the ai music will be perfectly adapted to your taste, heck it might even adapt to your current mood etc. And that's awesome in a way, but it feels like it also diminshes the point of creating your own music, at least a little bit and not to the point of quitting.

[@neek01]

@@xyhmo Well who knows i’m autistic but literally none of my friends or family have ever heard of my music. I don’t upload it nor care about views/plays regardless. To me, making music is the same thing as playing a game, it’s not about the end result (e.g other people liking it, guess and whatever) but the fun i had creating it.

[@EBeggsKOK]

I just saw an article yesterday where the US Copyright Office stated AI generated art can’t be copyrighted which I found interesting.

[@AutPen38]

When America elects an AI as president it won't be possible to unelect it or stop its owner from doing whatever he wants.

[@wakegary]

It legitimately learns how to avoid that very thing based on previous cases. I guess these computer beings are smarter than we think. What's next, robots generating the perfect pop song using a nearly-infinite collection of audio clips from previous songs, movies and video games? Humans would never stoop to that level.

[@apomegranatelove6881]

@@AutPen38 Whole premise to prequel of DUNE novels and films.

[@SuperSmashDolls]

As far as I'm aware, the problem is that the author is specifically saying "Midjourney drew this". Which is sort of like saying "Photoshop drew this" or "A monkey took this selfie" (yes that's a real copyright case, PETA filed it on behalf of a photographer who gave the monkey a camera, and *Wikipedia editors held a party when its copyright was revoked*). I've yet to see the copyright office actually try to hunt down people using AI art generators to revoke their copyright. I still wouldn't use it though since the whole "the AI might be generating a derivative work" thing is a far more significant threat to your work than just "the copyright office doesn't like that you named a computer program as the artist".

[@EBeggsKOK]

@@wakegary I see what you did there lol

[@mrsparkle7280]

11:36 yes. I want to make art because I want to share it with an audience that loves it. I want to connect with them and make them connect with each other over my piece of work. But suddenly I cannot share it with anyone. Whatever I will think of, It will have been already cooked up by AI. The ideas I have had for years, characters, designs and stories, that I have put blood sweat and tears into, when I finally get them out, they might already exist, (or at least something very similar), and claimed by some random person who accidentally prompted them. That's where we are headed. There is no place for human creativity there. In my case, me making art for only me to enjoy, it's just not fully why I do it. I don't really care about money, I just care about what I do, to be able to support itself and my very modest living, so I can only focus on making my art.

[@william_lloyd_Nix]

The answer is YES, checkout my channel and subscribe for AI Music capabilities.

[@vitkomusic6624]

Yup value is gonnago go 0

[@esmooth919]

To be fair, there really is nothing new under the sun. Keep making your art, and just be yourself. People will gravitate towards it.

[@jeffrobinson6145]

"Create something worth imitating." LOVE IT

[@VenusTheory]

Really wanted to not be all doom and gloom, seemed like a fitting takeaway haha.

[@hardermusic]

It's basically Neil Gaiman's "make good art" updated to 2022

[@bryangrunauer]

YES! excellent summary

[@StephenCoorlas]

Glad he took it there but wish that was more of the focal point here. I’m experimenting with AI in architecture and have found the same thing to be true regarding uniqueness. But equally important is the pursuit of creativity and storytelling outside the current realm of technological capabilities. Since the AI is fed existing data, its creations are mere synthetic compositions of already existing content. Sure after hundreds of iterations the content will be so unrecognizable that it will appear new, but we humans need to continue dreaming uniquely to preserve our worth and value in terms of feeding the AI new concepts and ideas 💡

[@sergiogabaldongarcia3492]

That´s literally one of the definitions of "classic": something worth taking as a model.

[@radiofloyd2359]

In a vacuum, I think I'd tend to agree with you. But at the same time we live in a world where people are just left to die if they don't make money. The horror to me is that a ton of people who are barely making enough to keep music even as a hobby will just kinda run out of jobs they can perform. Ideally the increased automation would signify people having more free time, but that's just not how capitalism works.

[@JoshMobleyMusic]

This, is the best response. Long term, there is no positive spin unless our societies radically change along with these advancements in AI. We are sleepwalking into a future where AI is the parasite that eats the world. I am an optimist at heart but boiling this down to passion and fulfillment is naive in my opinion.

[@587583922]

That's exactly how capitalism works. Unless you want the entirety of your musical life to be singing hundred year old songs as you toil in a field you'll never own for a lord that doesn't know you exist. You're an idiot.

[@Yfr28]

More free time to do what? AI will eventually automate humans out of hobbies at this rate

[@radiofloyd2359]

@@Yfr28 Hobbies are done to create internal satisfaction, nothing else.

[@capsaicinJT]

this.

[@cobraofearth]

"Hell, AI is even getting pretty good at running kids over" Got me belly laughing

[@untowardMedia]

The interesting development in AI is that, as you reference, the utopian view is that ultimately AI will take over the menial labour tasks to free us humans up to do deep and enriching creative work. The trend is almost the opposite-everything AI is producing that is making news is ostensibly creative work (albeit a kind of facsimile of previous created works). I wonder if it's the low stakes and imprecise nature of creative work that actually makes it a better kicking off point than high stakes precise work (driving, for example).

[@xrmasiso]

this this this this! i made a video exactly talking about this. WOULD LOVE to hear your thoughts

[@jp-is1is]

Opioid epidemic boutta skyrocket

[@typhoon320i]

Yes there are no rules in creative art. if you break the rules driving someone can die.

[@Ilyak1986]

If an AI makes a shitty picture or music track, ah well, such is life. If an AI drives a car or flies a plane incorrectly, people die. Much higher bar to clear for one than the other.

[@TheGrainhas]

Exactly. They are doing basically the opposite.

[@FuZZbaLLbee]

“Get that computer science degree.” Meanwhile me as a developer seeing chat-GPT generate code 😳

[@VenusTheory]

As awesome as it is, it was scary to try out for the first time haha. Watching it spit out functional C++ for an audio effect in seconds was like 'well.......k then.'

[@MrFram]

I probed it around for a bit. It seems good at simple or common stuff, but when I tried to make it more complicated, it became clear that we aint getting replaced anytime soon

[@lp712]

@@MrFram anytime soon? AI learns at exponentially increasing speeds

[@MrFram]

@@lp712 AI companies are throwing exponentially more supercomputers at at, but Moores law stopped years ago so there is a physical limit

[@lp712]

@@MrFram um no… we’re not even CLOSE to a physical limit lol wtf are you talking about. Ai is still progressing daily and you think we’ve hit a limit already? Give me a f****** break

[@royalcities]

Yesturday I asked the chat gpt AI if it can provide me a full written essay on if AI will replace me in music production. It convinced me it would not so Im choosing to believe that.

[@heelloooooo956]

hahahaha a few peeps have done that

[@BrofUJu]

That's what the robots want you to think!

[@VenusTheory]

Better put on your tinfoil hat and be ready to exit the matrix, man. That's what they WANT you to think!

[@Promethalus]

Asked the same for counsellors and psychotherapists. It told me not to worry, which is pretty sound mental health advice anyway

[@mattc3510]

Ask the opposite of that question it’s a lot more convincing

[@katyaforshort]

I feel like musicians, visual artists and all creators should unite against this unethical technology. If we stand together and defend our justice, then we will be able to change something. The future is in our hands

[@agaspversilia]

Well, it seems like the genie has already escaped the bottle. It's becoming easier and easier for people without any artistic abilities to create what looks like a good work of art. Even those who have no idea what a symphony is can produce one now. I guess we'll just have to accept that technology is changing the game when it comes to artistic creation. I’m a painter and I’m very pessimistic about this AI thing. Goddamned nerds are gonna cause immense damage to artists who, like me, still use centuries old techniques. Worse will be for musicians and digital artists in general though.

[@gamesandsht4134]

​@@agaspversilia the thing about music that is different from visual art is that the average person won't know what to even tell the AI to do

[@vinzbert4]

I see it as you! Lets do Something against it

[@DonaldFranciszekTusk]

@@agaspversilia Hi. What's your point now?

[@navarrito96]

This must be how photographers originally felt when iPhones became a thing. Or when we implemented autofocus. Or maybe this is how the animators of old felt when digital animation became a thing. Skill is valuable and a skilled over unskilled will always show through. Human talent and skill will always be valuable. I agree it feels heartbreaking, but just focus on your own work and pour those feelings out on your music. -written by Ai… maybe?

[@rickenbacker472]

I’ve always thought of human brains starting as empty black boxes. Our senses throw inputs into our brains, and those observations, sounds, tastes etc. bounce around and melt into a big soup. I don’t think we’re capable of imagining anything that isn’t some derivative of or iteration on the data that we’ve ingested. Sure we can imagine all sorts of novel scenarios or put unusual perspective on ideas, but it all derives from the stuff we’ve put in there. This is also exactly how ML neural nets work. ChatGPT/midjourney etc. are trained on HUGE data sets. Arguably more data than any one person can ingest in a lifetime. They can also generate novel perspectives and scenarios, just like humans. In short, I think we’ve truly reached a strange turning point. Something fundamental has changed, most of us just haven’t realised yet.

[@AutPen38]

It's not trained on "arguably more data" than any human, it's literally more data; a magnitude more... and it has perfect recall. e.g. a chess grandmaster might be able to recall every move in a hundred chess games, but the chess bots can be fed with tens of millions and remember everything. The same is true about music. e.g. The KZbin song identifier that can recognise millions of songs from tiny fragments in uploaded videos. No human can do that.

[@62serpens]

I agree. I think people saying that "but ai can never imitate human creativity... we have souls!!!" is cope in a sense. Our brains operate using the same mathematical principles as these ais will. Perhaps its time for us to get over ourselves as a species or something.

[@william_lloyd_Nix]

The answer is YES, checkout my channel and subscribe for AI Music capabilities.

[@michaelkonomos]

I think that our work will be even more devalued financially, but the value of what we do from a human perspective will NEVER go away. Humans will always want to connect with other humans. There is a reason why people want to see instruments and not just laptops at live shows - the humanity. The sense of connection. That will remain. But in a world of 8 billion people and now AI flooding their eyes and ears with "content", we will have to SHOW our work. Show we did it. Prove it wasn't AI and emphasize our humanity. Same reason why people want handmade ceramics when you can just go to target for a bowl. So I am worried about the financial value of what we do - which is already paying pennies, paying nothing. People's attention? that will be even HARDER to command when everyone is suddenly a "creator". But there will ALWAYS be humans who want to connect with other humans, no matter what tech comes along, because it's an inescapable part of our biology to do so. I do take comfort in that. Finally, F the tech overlord dude-bros coming for the Arts in the name of some utopia. Guess who gets all their creativity plundered for data? You and I. Guess who makes the money? The oligarchs. F those guys.

[@Amelia_PC]

Most of us artists have imposter syndrome, and this will affect our AI bros soon or later. And the emptiness they'll feel will be huge.

[@apomegranatelove6881]

Amazing how wealthy DJ’s have become … with beats electronic drum sections and special effects.

[@itheuserfirst3186]

This whole "humanity" nonsense surrounding AI art is amsuing. Artists have been faking "humanity" for centuries. They just have more competition now.

[@Mkshoffmeister]

The only thing that can stop me from creating is me. I love this sort of videos. Way too little creators talk about such things. So thank you VT, keep it coming.

[@xrmasiso]

would love to get your feedback on my video, candid thoughts about ai and chatgpt

[@RWMunchkin12788]

FWIW I think this is spot on for the topics you've covered. The main problem with your perspective and conclusion is of course that most people aren't actually that good at what they do, creatively or otherwise. Creating something worth imitating is something only a small fraction of the creative population will accomplish, and the rest that could rely on creative "grunt work" just won't keep up.

[@flickwtchr]

It's like the 1% that goes along their merry way each day benefiting from the work of "the little people" with their self-enriching moments at the gym, or at an expensive restaurant in a gentrified walkable neighborhood, who return to their home with manicured lawns, flip on the TV and nod in agreement with some "free market" capitalist opining about how low wage workers are just of a mediocre mindset not worthy of any protections like a "living wage" minimum wage law. In their minds, the little people don't enhance their lives one bit. They are what make up the majority of the sociopathic 1%. That sociopathic demographic make up the movers and shakers of AI ultimately, and they just don't care how many "little people" get disrupted onto the streets and kicked to the curb, just as long as it isn't in their gentrified neighborhoods and quaint business districts. But then AI will just help with that problem eventually with militarized police departments employing AI robots to keep those gentrified neighborhoods clean of the human refuse. Dark? Yeah, where we are headed as a society is dark indeed.

[@Davaroni]

This has a vaguely aristocratic flavor, but it’s probably true.

[@bassmonk2920]

The real gestalt of a live performance is watching, hearing and feeling the musicians cooperate with each other improvising in the moment......

[@gatergates8813]

Exactly this- AI can make consumable "content" but it can never truly give you the art of performance

[@TemmeSikkema]

Cameron, your videos keep getting better and deeper. I really like your presentations and your thoughts on these kind of things ❤

[@nyanko2077]

The day humanity relies on AI to emulate Art will be the day it will have lost its very soul.

[@bidossessi]

I think we're crossing that bridge right now.

[@scratchy996]

Yeah, now tell me exactly what a "soul" is. You have to consider that all media in recent decades has been created using algorithms. The algorithms are now available to the public for the first time.

[@user-cr4pz5yg7y]

Humanity does not have a soul. Only bills and debts.

[@dirremoire]

You're late to the party.

[@SeaMonster111]

That day, my friend, is already here.

[@paulandamyw]

A simple and heartfelt thanks for all of your honesty and willingness to share your incredibly valuable, professional experience. Amidst a topic that could easily be a complete killjoy you have managed to fortify hope in a group of individuals that is already continuously plagued by insecurities and anxieties. Peace and gratitude, Paul

[@countorringtonludlow5211]

My inner Dadaist hopes that AI leaves a smoldering crater where brand builders and "influencers" previously felt comfortable. I absolutely hope it blows everything so out of proportion that it lays waste to concepts like human expression being squared up with likes and follows to give it value.

[@TheCSJones]

This.

[@enough2715]

I hope AI kills the internet. It's being flooded faster everyday, people will find it completely meaningless to log on anymore.

[@goodingmusic]

@@enough2715 LOVE this thread.

[@grrdjf]

This is great stuff, please keep the art/philosophy/technology stuff coming.

[@cellovid]

There have been a hundred years of painful upheavals in the music industry. The present music industry bears only a slight resemblance to that of the pre-amplification/recording/broadcasting/internet age.

[@BennJordan]

Great video! I purposely didn't watch it until finishing mine, but I did set up an RNN to scan your video and write mine for me.

[@NematicFifth]

I'm about ready to give up on music and this video just feeds the fire.

[@kidzorro]

me too

[@AlbertKimMusic]

We are officially in the early ages of AI, it is both surreal and frightening at the same time

[@mf--]

A probability lookup table used in images and music is hardly general AI.

[@Leukick]

Do you think in the future people will actually LIKE listening to music and consuming art that was fully made by ai? Or would they feel weird about it? Would be strange listening to a song knowing dang well it was not made by a human, but a souless machine, even if it did sound good. It's logical to predict that ai would take over just by projecting what would happen based on current trends... but what if people end up pushing back and simply not liking using it as much as we would have thought?

[@AlbertKimMusic]

@@Leukick I just can't see it, especially for music. People cherish artists and composers for their unique styles, and the anticipation of waiting for what they might come up with next. Honestly though it may be inevitable, When AI's actually become sentient, the perspective may change

[@Leukick]

@@AlbertKimMusic Yeah the perception may change, key word "may". I think human nature may mostly reject some of the proposed ideas, although much of the ai tools will be handy and gain popularity

[@sonicmistress]

@@Leukick It'll never happen, no such thing as AI and anyone who promotes its existence is a fool. Think about it....Humans are generally stupid.....And you think stupid people can make computers smarter! Don't think so. Stupid in, stupid out.....; ) What's more dangerous is talking about these silly rumours about technology that will never exist, just for clicks, lol.

[@Oakyere]

The thing for me is, what does adapting look like? Is it learning to use new tools that remove the tedious parts of what we do, that benefit everyone including the weirdos that enjoy the tedious parts? Or is it learning to write a prompt and let AI do 90% of the work for you? And letting more people create, not just create, but make amazing works of art and music in less time with less overall experience, while that seems good and would have seemed amazing when I started, I think would kind of dilute art in general. At least from my experience the more I've improved and learned, the more I understand what it actually takes to create. I've found a greater appreciation for art and music and view it with so much more care and genuine interest then when I started. It makes me think kind of "If everyone's special then no one is" and appreciation for our work will fade out because its something everyone can do. Especially unique creators who maybe have moved on to other things and their past work is so beloved because there WILL be no more of it, but now with AI we could be able to generate hundreds or thousands of continuations. I'd like to add too, I've noticed that the presence of AI art, thats become pretty good recently, has made me sometimes dismiss human art thinking its AI. something I would normal be amazed by I skip over thinking its just another AI piece

[@jondellar]

Absolutely fascinating; thank you so much for this discussion. I’m a KZbinr/amateur musician myself and can see the careful thought and sheer hard graft that goes into your videos. Top-notch! 🙂

[@actualkevin]

I see a lot of concern about “AI taking over” from artists. I do not see concern about “AI bulk-falsely copyright claiming against artists” and this IS happening NOW as I have personally learned. Also people were lighting their hair on fire about “AI” in 1986.

[@VenusTheory]

That was actually a segment of this video originally! I cut it out though as I feel like that's just something that's worth exploring in a separate video, too good of a topic to waste in a 2min segment.

[@SineEyed]

What are you talking about, youtube's Content ID system, or something else?.. 🧐

[@AdamElteto]

@@SineEyed Just search The KZbins for "splice problem", he has a great video somewhat related to the subject.

[@flickwtchr]

It doesn't help when people using AI generative models completely dismiss the real concerns of artists on public forums. It is an absolutely absurd position to take.

[@wakegary]

I bet some of that hair was synthetic too. Traitors

[@krsmanjovanovic8607]

You know what? I AM GOING to go to graphic design college and do everything I wanted to: I will meet artists my age from my country, I will make great connections, have crazy parties and cozy silent nights with select few friends, I am going to learn from the best and the best of all: nothing is going to stop me from drawing! Positive competition will make me practice even harder and push my imagination to whole other level, art connects everything I am passionate about and gives me power to express myself about those things, it would be a shame to die living a life that isnt mine "I did it because I wanted to, I liked it" Heisenberg (Walter White)

[@Yfr28]

That's a great mindset but there's, of course, the matter of income

[@Blackfatrat]

If you're rich enough to go to school with the prospects of jobs being low afterwards, go for it, but otherwise maybe take it as side courses in uni while doing another careeer too. But you do you, just remember to not get loaded with debt without getting an income eventually.

[@wakegary]

Totally. I mean we're 'trained' on centuries of amazing art. Sometimes I think that SciFi trained us to be so angry about this. Worried artists need to take a step back and ask themselves why this will be their demise. The time between these types of historical panic reruns (printing press, electricity, smart women not being witches, the internet, iphones, the wheel, cremation, VHS, cassettes, electronic music, vacuums, the GUI OS, Alexa... ok fuck Alexa tho) is shortening, so the anger is going to end a lot of people faster than the tech will.

[@Amelia_PC]

Agreed. Do it, man! I'm a veteran artist who is still paying my bills as an artist, and I don't see that changing anytime soon. I've been studying and using AI for 2D Stable Diffusion, stretching it to the limits to see what it can do. Honestly, for comic books, it's still crap. For composition? Unless the artist using AI wants something random, it'll work only if you use your own sketches to guide AI, because AI has a boring concept of composition. So, unless AI reaches the level of human mind abstraction in the next ten years, you don't need to worry. Only non-artists or newcomers think the current AI is already amazing.

[@levibest2409]

@@Blackfatrat I was going to school for graphic design to had to change it to med bc art does not make enough money as a main course it's best as a side like u said

[@vyacheslavmalkov425]

Thank you so much for the content you make! I have been on a deep reflecting roller coaster of what is music for me and how I really want to be involved in it and what to make of it all. I was even entertaining a thought of giving up my guitar and music endeavors all together multiple times now. Topics of the music industry, AI, insane competition, almost luck based careers, etc. really gives you a ride through emotions. You've helped me clear up my mind on so many levels, I cannot appreciate it enough. Thank you again.

[@william_lloyd_Nix]

The answer is YES, checkout my channel and subscribe for AI Music capabilities.

[@davidnollmusic363]

I'm reading the book "Our Final Invention" by James Barratt - I'm frightened! Thanks for the excellent video Cameron, hope you'll make more of this kind. Wishing you all the best!

[@Enrique-ir4yq]

It is depressing to see how AI will destroy first profesions that people love and dream of doing, as you said profesions where suply ounumbers demand. Nobody asked to replace artists and musicians, nobody needed a drawing, a song or movie to be created from zero in just seconds. But what pushed these companies to create these image and music generative AI was not the desire to solve a problem or a need for humanity, but just feeding the ego of these AI engineers that wanted to prove that they were able to make machines do the unthinkable and to do flashy and suprising stuff. But stuff that we do not need. We need to solve problems and make the people happy , not creating stupid consumers that are fed with repetitive souless content

[@MattPerrin]

And somewhere in rooms lit by kaleidoscopes of blinking LED lights... Aphex Twin, Squarepusher, and Venetian Squares work on their next tracks... 😄

[@exist0142]

Amazing video!! Very thought provoking, love it, and totally agree with everything you said ❤❤

[@stevenwhinnery]

Thank you so much for posting this. SO interesting, and so very relevant to the arts generally and not just music. It's very important to keep up with this very fast evolving development. Well researched and well presented. Many thanks!!

[@joelluth6384]

Obsolescence doesn't have to be all bad. I worked for a defense contractor when the Soviet Union collapsed, my wife became a professional photographer just as the smartphone took off. Progress is often painful, but it can also push you to adapt and grow.

[@starsky101]

I remember when a phone was added to a camera. Ridiculous idea was a flop, roll forward 10 years and every phone has a camera. Go figure

[@wakegary]

My right hand still does these drunken rants about life before the Fleshlight

[@bloody4558]

What's the progress in letting a program that has extremely limited creativity do all the work? At the end of the day AI will never be better than true artists at making actual art. Yes, hey will eventually be good enough at fulfilling specific requests. But real music made by the inspiration of a real artist will always be better. All AI does is prolong the problems all creative works are facing right now, which is a retarded industry that cannot comprehend that creativity cannot be controlled. That forcing patterns and "proven formulas" is guaranteed to make inferior products. Wanna know what's funny about economists, merchants and the like? Every other industry and science has found walls that impeded their progress, whenever this happens, scientists unit in order to comprehend the problem and solve it. But when it comes to money, they only solutions they ever try is "it's my way or the highway". That's why creative workers are so mistreated. Every other science finds workarounds for there problems, only merchants refuse any other attempt other than trying to control production.

[@wakegary]

@Lord Vader totally. the time between these insane breakthroughs will get smaller and smaller until something gives. the pressure that's building up has to go somewhere.

[@dannypavlov913]

Grow into what? If everything is replaced by AI in 5-10 years what exactly should most people do? It'sb bad. Some things aren't all bad, but this, unless the advancements plateau, is bad for sure.

[@nk-cn9sv]

i really feel like ai is going to set the level a bit up for a lot of things, for example; all those bland blog posts wont be written by people anymore. And i mean a lot of them arent already anyways.

[@jjstarrprod]

Great vid, and I like a lot that you're trying to see it all from a balanced perspective (pros and cons) rather than all the doom and gloom of other artists channels. While the optimistic in me agrees with 80% of your points, the realistic in me can only see how, in a rather short amount of time, 60 to 80% of the workforce in creative industries like animation, illustrations, writing, and music, will lose their jobs (not necessarily on the big top of the line jobs like directors and producers, but more like the below the line, like concept artists, animators, vfx, colorists, heck even storyboarders and editors...) Sure, it might be that since all the "menial" jobs are being taken over by AI, everybody can now be a director, or a producer, or their own boss on their own production... Except 1/ not everyone is fit to be their own creators. Some are more fit to be just specialized technicians. The same way than not everyone is fit to be a leader/director/president. 2/ even if they were, there's gonna be a flood of new content that will just completely overwhelm the audience (I already almost never open my Netflix, just because the homepage with its infinite doomscrolly list of shows looks damn intimidating to me, and sometimes, I let 3 months pass with me paying the goddamn monthly fee without opening once the goddamn site, so imagine if all of a sudden, the whole goddamn world becomes a director and with the help of ever more efficient AI, everybody starts to make their own shows, and the flood will be that much more overwhelming. You said it yourself : supply already overthrows demand). So that means everybody will be a director/producer of a show/movie/animation/documentary/album that nobody will watch, because if you can grow the amount of creators, you can't grow the amount of audience in the world, neither can you grow the free time they've got to consume art in general. 3/ And in the meantime artistic skills can only be maintained, or levelled up by repetition and actual long and hard work, which means having to do it as a full time job. Which won't happen if nobody can make a living out of it, so, unless UBI becomes a thing fast, in every category (musical, written and visual), human art in and of itself will fall aside in the side gig category, the fun hobby status, which will in turn pull the brakes hard on innovation and originality, since people will have to find another low pay full time job to just stay alive, and be exhausted at the end of the day to create anything, leading to the effective end of human art. All of a sudden, I wish Andrew Yang became president... PS : Funny thing is that on this video about AI, your voice timber sounds a lot like one of those robots voices that we can hear in generic tech reviews bot channels vids ^^. Not a critic, your delivery was great. It just so happened that it also ironically fit very well with the topic ^^

[@Novalarke]

This is one of my favourite videos of yours. Good work.

[@ItsWesSmithYo]

Artists create for personal reasons…the business can do whatever it wants, people will still be artists, connect, perform, etc…and automate whatever isn’t important to them…thanks for the ideas 🙏😎🖤🐓

[@infectioussneeze9099]

you're talking like there arent artists who rely on art as a living

[@ItsWesSmithYo]

@@infectioussneeze9099 There are a lot of people that rely on getting paid to do a lot of things, but rarely their entire life. Things change, you adapt. Art doesn’t care about money, but money sure cares about art. If you get your bag as an artist, cool, but art doesn’t need people making a living off it in order to exist. Good luck out there 🤙🏽😎🖤🕺

[@computrhead]

I liked this video. I do believe that being different enough will help you in the long run in the music industry. AI will become more advanced but it only means that we can try harder to be more innovative. It’s about improving our craft. Also, thanks for the George Carlin reference.

[@braveheartsbeardstudios]

I too loved the George Carlin reference!

[@ZlinMusic]

Amazing to think just over 100 years after Karel Čapek’s seminal work Rossum’s Universal Robots (which fun fact, is where the word robot was coined 🤖) we are now finally having the discussion on what truly makes art “human” if AI works in a derivative fashion similar to that of humans. Unsettling, but great philosophical topics you touched on!

[@avsystem3142]

Actual, the name of the play was R.U.R., which does stand for the phrase you cited.

[@StrenkoB]

I just got recommended your channel from a friend. Really liked hearing your perspective on AI generation and I'm definitely gonna check out more from you. Great stuff!

[@Aeternum_Gaming]

As a musician, if the rise of artificial intelligence has the potential to render your music obsolete, it may indicate that there are greater underlying issues at play. While technological advancements have altered various aspects of the music industry, such as production and distribution, the creativity and artistic expression that is intrinsic to music creation remains a distinct human endeavor. It is important to acknowledge the significance of AI's potential impact, while also focusing on honing one's craft and embracing innovation in the industry.

[@djsusan00]

Brb typing more prompts for the next Venus Theory video 😭🥴

[@VenusTheory]

AI Venus awaits your submissions

[@bethpulliam803]

I'm a pianist who stumbled upon your channel today. Great content!! Your voice is mesmerizing! Just became a sub! Thank you!

[@avsystem3142]

If Cameron is put out of business as a music creator by AI he can always get a gig as a voice-over announcer.

[@Ilyak1986]

Wonderful video. I love the central message of "when the robots do the grunt work, the humans are freed up to work on the imaginative aspect of creation". Coupled with the democratization of being able to do what previously took years if not decades worth of study, that might result in an explosion of creativity.

[@spectralknights2]

This is supposed to be what Google and IBM watson/deep blue is. But they're too relax and missed this opportunity...

[@mattlau]

The beauty of Art is that it is subjective and even if AI can produce a great song, a human being can do the same-not necessarily better or worse, just different. In the near future, it would be like comparing AI music with jazz music with indie rock with pop music. It will just become it's own sub genre and that may attract some people, but not everyone may enjoy it. Music is so subjective that you cannot convince people to 'like' your taste in music. There will always be a market for musicians and their niches. If you're a Musician, keep creating stuff. I know I will.

[@doyoubinoame8483]

Never was into your tutorial videos - probably because i watched dozens of other tutorials in my time - but these ethical/creative videos are good. Nicely worded, good takes. I guess AI can take over making tutorials, but will it ever be able to talk about ethics and creativity - who knows

[@seanemmettfullerton]

Bless you, Cameron. Cheers! :) Here's to optimism and pursuing original ideas that move us all forward. Ha! and here's to being that grain of sand in the oyster of life...

[@Linguae_Music]

AI has to learn from input material. To beat the AI you just have to stop being so derivative and actually come up with something novel. That's why my new vocalist for my bagpipe ragtime trio is a big boofin' newfoundland.

[@VenusTheory]

Take that, robot! 🐕‍🦺

[@SineEyed]

Akshully... OpenAI already has a music ai where, if I wanted to, I can use 30 seconds of my faev Cannibal Corpse track, and have it return an interpretation of that musical style as if Chopin got his hands on it. So, a nice death piano concerto in D quadruple fucking minor, with some Chinese traditional vocals peppered in just for tf of it. You snooze, you lose, meatbag.. 😜

[@hgzmatt]

If only that was easy. Most art is derivative.

[@jensenraylight8011]

that something novel will be used to fed the AI and they will oversaturated the market with thousands of cheap clone of your novel Techniques. people won't be able to recognize you as the Original, because the market flooded with thousands of fakes in fact, every music that you produce will be fed to AI to Disrupt you. everything that available to the public will be fed to AI you will only lose, with no upside, only downside

[@neek01]

Actually yes but it isn’t tied to one genre or one artist. It can create music that involved every genre combined and mix the style of several artists, it’s all possible

[@krazywabbit]

"I've been wanting to make this video for sometime.." Something I've noticed you saying at the outset of these types of thought videos. As long as you have a backlog of this in your dome, AI will never win. It may close the gap, but won't win. Unless AI gives birth to another piece of AI, then it's game over.

[@VenusTheory]

I'm also extremely happy to be in a position where I can finally make the videos I actually want to make haha. But yeah agreed - as mentioned in the video, the ability to iterate is something AI just doesn't have. Deep learning systems may change that in the future, but of course predicting the future of tech is like reading wax.

[@neiljamessloan]

Beautiful man! I have my filing cabinet of lost songs ready to re-create. hehehe. Seriously though... well put :) Don't fear something that is not of yourself.

[@peppyp7323]

so good. love the new philosophical flavor added to this channel ❤!

[@aquaticborealis4877]

The emotional relevance for creating music is not something that can be easily AI’d. Often there is a subconscious psychological cultural undercurrent of a “time” or “place”. This is often brought to the forefront by artists. Now with social media and AI, this might be detectable, but that would mean examining our social media. For Twitter, Instagram, public Facebook pages, that would be feasible (and Musk and Zuck are no doubt salivating over such a prospect), but that’s only for the sentiment expressed on social media. There’s often an unspoken aspect as well that could be hard to figure out. Especially in societies that don’t have free expression. There’s also the prospect of artists litigating endlessly, claiming material as stolen. I expect that to be a futile effort in the long run though.

[@PlugInGuruVideo]

Dude, another GREAT great topic! I believe this is just the tip of the iceberg. When computers from Mr.Musk grow legs and start taking our dogs for a walk, it's going to be even more visible that machines can do many things as well if not better than we can. I am blessed to have been in the creative sound design industry since 2009 and it has transformed dramatically since I first started. With each new library I created for Omnisphere, the market shrunk. Primarily this is because more and more musicians that used to make their living as a musician discovered that supplying plug-ins and sounds for OTHER musicians is a far more lucrative gig than loading the van for a $300 gig divided between 5 guys each night. Or pouring your heart out for 10 songs for $100 each and then being 100% bought out. Where it goes, I really don't think anybody can predict but it's coming at a pace we're not going to be ready for. "Be worth imitating" is a great mantra for all of us to put above our studio doors. Keep it up.

[@johnfowlertrailrunning]

Loving these thought-provoking videos dude! Keep them coming! Have been fascinated by AI for years and funny how long it has taken for the populace to start taking it seriously. AI ethics is a huge issue and I would be fascinated to hear your views on it and how it affects the music industry. Best. 🤘

[@vp9348]

Thank you for your concepts - This has given me some closure since the topic came about since I'm just starting

[@barrytheartist.]

Well the thing is , true art comes from within a person. Meaning their expirences and influences , music or not. When all of this is brought together in songwriting and using the tools we have creatively to paint a picture. That is something that isn’t replaceable but only can be mimicked barely . Good luck to everyone in the music community and don’t forget to create art! Not just programmed, explore and break the rules.

[@Jayenkai]

You know when they're on the holodeck, and they ask for a nice scene, and then add a few characters, and make such a character do such a thing.. AI enhanced creativity, right there..

[@vatsalismusic]

the video gave me chills bro specially the last when you said "create something worth imitating" subed to the channel now!

[@Jesus_winchester1992]

hey fellow, nice to find this video, I'm from Brazil and I'm making an academic work I decided to talk about work in the future AI, and your video is going to help me a lot..... by the way, that is so crazy the title "rise of the machines" hahahahah

[@imraan6405]

Cameron, I want to take this opportunity to tell you that i deeply respect everything you do for the community. Haters gonna hate, but we are going to create ❤️💪🏽 Best wishes Buckadoodle 🙌🏽

[@HOLLASOUNDS]

AI art and music mainly just replicates the huge accumulation of data on the internet and by that definition is only creating something from what We have created. I get very random often just messing around with sounds and midi and then I hit gold, it's not planned it just happens, and I dont see AI being all that different and certainly not better then a human.

[@earlgrey2130]

Thats just human bias. An AI follows the same concept of randomizing elements of the formula to end up with new stuff.

[@SineEyed]

Yeah but the ai won't ever know if the music it just generated is any good or not. That can only be subjectively evaluated--and that can only be done by humans..

[@HOLLASOUNDS]

@@earlgrey2130 Yes that's what I said, I dont see AI being all that different from what I do already. Most of My music is never planned but AI or generative and other assistance has made some things that used to take all day, I can now do within minuts.

[@HOLLASOUNDS]

@@SineEyed I have made all sorts of music and jumped across multiple genres and made alot of stuff and some of it is not going to sound good to most, and that due to these factors 1 out of key elements, 2 timming is off, 3 Levels are messed up, 4 bad EQ clashing frequencys of elements, 5 poor stereo panning and width. All 6 bad sound selection. All 6 of these elements are crucial to what makes music feel comfortable to listen to and any one of these issues will ruin a patetul song or music and there are now AI or generative assistant plugins that can aid or do these tasks. Still needs a human to control everything.

[@neilmacmusic]

i love ❤️your videos and your insights- only one thing: there is a deep booming low frequency in your audio mix that sets off my subs and needs to be eq’d out of the mix with an hpf around 40-50hz Speaking of robotics this low end will also be triggering youtubes algorithms and making them drop your overall mix volume more than it needs to be

[@Praxiszooms]

what a fantastic, competent and pleasing to look at video - everything I ever wanted in a youtube video!!!! FANTASTIC!!!

[@StaticTeaz]

The beauty of great art and music is . . . imperfection.

[@EntropicEcho]

AI can emulate that easily.

[@StaticTeaz]

I disagree. There is still a noticable difference between the analog and digital realms.@@EntropicEcho Digital is linear. Tape, for instance, is not.

[@EntropicEcho]

​@@StaticTeaz I would be surprised if you could consistently pick out an analog vs digital recording in a double blind test. ;) There are excellent tape emulators out there. I totally get how the difference in workflow creates different results, I have a lot of analog gear and everything I do is purely with hardware synths too, but I don't for a second believe there's a difference in sound.

[@HeyPich]

As long as people are interested in making music, there will be a market for creators

[@cesruhf2605]

yeah i don't think everyone will be a fan of many AI artists 😭

[@ckjjclan]

Your videos are so good… they look great, are well presented, and so well thought out. Question - do you ever say “ummm” when shooting your parts?

[@mkirbymusic]

Once again, I applaud you for taking the time to make this video on an important topic. I really resonate with the thoughts you have on all of this stuff and created a clip of that MASSIVELY important mindset you said that creatives should have

[@bluelabelmuzik]

Soon the whole world will be a touch screen kiosk

[@VenusTheory]

Can't help but think of the Hardees machine from Idiocracy.

[@johnrun712]

If AI does something for you, that means you are not doing it yourself, so I think of it only as a starter SOMETIMES and no more. There is enough of that evil AI in our lives and it'll suck out your Soul (often it's intended role), which is kind of useful for real art.

[@leirumanuel]

When I need motivation to create and music making I see one of this Venus Theory videos. :) Thanks

[@zacharyhasenbalg999]

Totally agree with the point you ended on. Being authentic and true to yourself with your creations has always been the only way to truly stand out and create something unique and meaningful. So many artists feel like they can’t do that because they feel the need to make stuff that’s commercial in order to get paid. But that takes what is the very reason that they became an artist out of it, that’s not being creative, that’s being a ‘robot’ to get paid. True creativity comes from not giving af about what’s commercial and making what you personally are drawn towards and that’s something that AI will never have that humans always will. Humans can put they’re thoughts, feelings, and emotions into their art and other people will feel it too, especially if there’s a story behind it. That’s something AI just can’t bring to the table.

[@scossar]

You've nailed it! As someone who's a fan of a lot of creators, I'll just note that a large part of what I value is the human connection I feel with the creators. AI can't replace that. I'm hoping that one result of AI is that humans will strive to be more human - warts and all.

[@user-cr4pz5yg7y]

The actual result will be more world wars. At some point the nukes will go off. The only people striving to be human are the poor at the bottom that have zero effect on history.

[@itheuserfirst3186]

AI can do that whether you want to believe it or not.

[@scossar]

@@itheuserfirst3186 You can fool some people sometime, but you can't fool all the people all the time, so now we see the light....

[@BigMTBrain]

@@unknownlox6971 Virtual AI-based performers already exist, mainly very popularly in Asian countries, and will spread all over. Their popularity is for exactly the reason you state, but in this case, an AI persona to human connection. Humans are generating these personas, giving them full background stories, various personality types, quirks, emotional issues, dating histories, family issues, etc., that humans can relate to, follow, cheer for, and celebrate with.

[@MrAldafox]

So hang on just to clarify, what was the main take away from this video? That basically now is the time to unapologetically be yourself when making music, if you want to keep having work and stay competetive?

[@esmooth919]

My biggest problem with AI music generators and art generators is, it essentially steals from creators worldwide, new and old, by searching a huge database for things that I've already been created, and essentially stitching them together. For instance, I was using an AI music generator website last night, and one of the songs that the robot spat out sounded suspiciously like the late Teddy pendergrass. And that's how I know they pull from other sources.

[@thelastredhead2653]

As a writer, I need an app to block AI from stealing my stuff.

[@musicproductionsimplified]

What a great topic! As much as AI art will help streamline certain things (like how I've used it to help create cover art for an album, ep or single) I don't think it'll replace the feeling of creating a song from scratch, where you put all the elements together yourself. There's something special and fulfilling about completing an arrangement of a track that you won't be able to experience by using AI. It's like when you use a pre-made loop for a track and you know deep down that you didn't create that loop and it's just not that satisfying to use (not saying you can't use loops, I'm just stating a valid point) vs compiling the drum patterns, chord progressions and melodies yourself. When you do everything yourself, it feels 100% like "you" which is what I think art is supposed to feel like from an independent artist. When a bigger project is compiled from multiple people, than that's different since you are putting multiple minds together to achieve a goal, but at least it's still human.🤷 😅

[@atlanta2076]

There's this song "Drowning in the Sun", written by an AI mimicking Kurt Cobain. And it's SO eerie. The vocals came from a guy who sounds exactly like Kurt did, and his voice is what keeps the whole thing together. The song does sound very much like Nirvana, but you can tell there is something profoundly wrong with it (because it wasn't written by a human). It also fails to nail Kurt's style. His songs were always compact and round. But DITS starts somewhere, goes somewhere else and then just ends somehow. It's meandering like crazy. Whenever I listen to it, I'm somewhere between laughing and shivering (our of horror). There might and will be a market for such songs, but I don't think that AI-music will go beyond that. At least, its music will always lack one crucial thing: warmth and depth.

[@KozmykJ]

AI Me is going to view this video to save me some time. AI My Ears is now going to listen to all my music library as well. I draw the line at AI My Digestive Tract doing my ingestion for me ...

[@VenusTheory]

But what if you had a bluetooth compatible smart stomach?

[@KozmykJ]

@@VenusTheory If it was compatible with my Gratification Chip then I might consider it; always supposing that AI Me doesn't override my decision ...

[@Alice-Efe]

What a great video. love it! My two cents on AI and art is that I think we should be a bit careful with sayings like "The AI will never as creative as humans or AI can never match a human's creative process". There are strong indications that humans' learning processes are exactly same as AIs at the base level. The current difference is that the AIs that we are seing around is "Narrow AIs" which are trained to do one certain task and deliver one single objective. We possess "General Intelligence" similar to "General AI", .we learn from information and experiences we have and convert them into art we create. Compared to the Narrow AI which doesn't have the broad range of experiences and information that we have. Now the dilemma starts when we have a general or near general AI and it is able to create "better than human" art from its own experiences. Which is quite likely as AI can literally experience hundreds or thousands of year of information and live through it. If we define our art being superior to and more creative than AI, I am afraid this would lead to disappointment when the general AI arrives. I think beauty of Art is in its indivuduality. The certain experiences and certain emotions that we have lead to a certain reflection of an art, which is truly unique to its creator. And this is what makes each art piece unique and valuable. A resonance off an indivudual that will never repeat again.

[@rohanwalker2404]

I am always appreciative of your videos, you are always spot on. Thank you.

[@Morroh]

I’m curious about the influence AI art is going to have on human creators. Like what if we have an AI Beatles or Nirvana level of inspiring music come out and just completely change music for everyone. Whether or not AI has the ability to produce something ls something I’m really curious about. A large part of that kind of pop culture influence came from the image/presence of said human artist. Maybe we’ll have to wait til we have androids who are generating and performing their own content? The future is gonna get weird man.

[@lokelosk]

So, I'm a translator. My "real job" is translating stuff (I do music as a hobby and for personal fulfillment). And I cannot even count the amount of times I heard people saying "Google Translate/DeepL/Bing is going to take your job". People have been saying this since Google Translate first appeared around the corner, almost 20 years ago and man, that thing is still dumb. I mean, if you only know English and some other European language, it seems to work ok, it can translate some sentences or paragraphs and make almost no mistake. Now try putting a book on it. It won't work. We have real use cases where people tried to do this and _everybody_ noticed how poor the job was done. In the gaming world, there are quite a few big names out there using AI to translate stuff, but they don't announce it publicly. Boy, I wonder why. Of course, they always blame the human translators they don't use when people notice that things are off. Now, the other day, I tried using GPT-3 to see how far it could go, regarding to text quality it could generate. I broke it on the second prompt I gave it. I'm not that impressed. So yeah, if something as "simple" as translation the AI still doesn't make the cut, I doubt it will, in the professional world, for visual arts and music. The real issue, from my point of view, are big companies forcibly pushing unfinished "smart" products that aren't ready to be deployed and blaming the human labor, instead of the faulty algorithm. That's what I predict it will happen from this whole debacle. This, and the moral issue regarding secretly breaking copyright to feed the algorithms. If we can overcome these problems, then yeah, AIs would become stupidly useful tools, that's for sure.

[@SineEyed]

In what way do you believe copyrights have been violated in order train ai?..

[@lokelosk]

If someone uses something you created for commercial purposes without paying the fees for it, or at least giving due credit, it's violating copyright. Even worse when they don't even inform you. And that's basically how these AIs are trained. And tbh, that's the biggest problem I have with them. If they "harvested" things in a more "honest" way, I wouldn't complain as much.

[@SineEyed]

@@lokelosk I see... you have the same misperceptions many others do, it seems. I think those who take your view have a poor understanding of copyrights, or a poor understanding of how these ai are trained and the nature of the relationship between the training data and the models. Both could be the case as well, I suppose. Maybe not for you, though. So is it copyrights you don't have a good grasp on? That'd be my guess, going by what you said before. It seems you're unclear on the scope of the protections they offer. It's true that a creative work can't just be used by anyone to make a profit from, but that depends on what, and it depends on how it's being "used". If you take a photograph and put it up online, I'm not allowed to screenshot your photo and use it in my own publication or whatever. But if you posted that picture onto a public platform, anyone can look at that photo for as long as they want. And maybe one of them has a keen eye and knows a thing or two about photography; if he's able to infer the manner in which your shot was composed, there are no copyrights that exist to restrict him from trying it out on his own. Anyone is free to learn whatever they will from whatever they find publicly accessible. The data used to train ai was all publicly available. And so the ai got to doing what they do - learning everything they can. No copyrights have been violated. No image created by an ai could be pointed out by some artist claiming it to be his. That's because the training data doesn't remain in the model once training is complete. Not one pixel is transferred from an existing work to any ai image generated. Art students learn their craft in part by studying the methods of artists who came before them; the same could be said for these ai..

[@lokelosk]

​@@SineEyed Sorry to disappoint, but I do understand copyright, and that's a very grey area. I also do understand that there's a vacuum between the laws of copyright and the emergence of new tech that a lot of these AI-based softwares are trying to exploit while people don't seem to grasp the technology. Something being up on the internet doesn't mean it's up for grabs for commercial purposes. There's a reason why we have privacy laws on social networks and such, even though we are there on our own volition. Now, the comparison between AI and students is either very naive, or made in very bad faith. Yes, both learns upon what already existis, but AI can't create new things, people can. That's why I partly agree with Cameron that artists won't necessarily be replaced. An AI could never create a new art style, such as humans did with impressionism or cubism. AIs can only iterate on what already exists. Saying that someone learning how to paint and an AI swooping Pinterest are the same is a fallacy. I'm not against AIs, but I will forever be against corporations using data, such as images on the internet, for free without the author's consent or without compensation. The engineers writing the algorithms are being paid, why are not the artists whose works are being fed into the machine? Without them, the algorithms are useless.

[@joshuafridman3356]

Literally went to school for AI and appreciate your posting this actually coming from experience and knowledge about the subject!

[@GEUcompositions]

Love your wisdom :) Keep it up :)

[@mrnelsonius5631]

I use AI tools (more or less) in music creation every day and so far they don’t step on my creative oversight in any way. At best it’s like having an assistant engineer who sets up a template for you. Which is awesome, saves me time but all the creative decisions are mine. I love stuff like Ozone, I run the assistant to see what suggestions it makes. Gives me a fresh perspective then I go about making my decisions. Ironically I think creative work will remain the safest kind of work from being totally taken over by automation. The “flaws” in human beings are what make us so good at art and creative innovation

[@mrnelsonius5631]

@@michaelmorgan4118 that’s kind of my point though: all the software in the world can’t substitute for musicianship. I can see certain sample based genres allowing some degree of cut and paste faking it. But you’re not going to get far if you, the human being, doesn’t understand music inside and out. Somebody at the helm has to know it and have taste

[@mrnelsonius5631]

@@michaelmorgan4118 I read a book about that many years ago. Pretty damn chilling. I’m feeling more fossil-y by the day for what it’s worth. We definitely probably share concerns about AI in general. Music making just isn’t my biggest one. Though I do often wish popular music would have a revolution against hard tuning and hard quantization towards something more human again

[@flickwtchr]

I get your point, but there is zero doubt that for instance concept artists will find it much more difficult to retain employment whether on a team working in the gaming industry, or a freelancer. This technology is going to disrupt MANY industries, and there is ZERO doubt that it will be a net loss of money making opportunities. There is just no way around this fact. Have you seen the power of ChatGPT? And it is mind blowing that it is in it's "beta" phase.

[@kidflock5682]

hey mr nelsonius, you mind letting us know what ai tools you use?

[@mrnelsonius5631]

@@kidflock5682 whether they’re all “AI” or not is up for debate but lots of “smart” tools: Sonible, Ozone, Gulfoss, even the assistant on RX I use frequently. They’re all kind of automating certain tasks. I don’t rely on them in terms of artistic decisions and taste but I do use them to save time and get second opinions

[@hey_maurice]

Artists are like doctorate students. You need to go REALLY deep in one area to advance the baseline of human expectation and understanding. Whether you’re a fan of AI or not, you really need to ask yourself whether you’re really doing that and, if so, how you’re strengthening your connection with your target audience. Then the “1000 fans” playbook can kick in.

[@wonderwheel80s]

Good point. I'm starting to see a pattern in this videos. First, you put yourself in the shoes of people who do different, but related jobs (in this case people who hires musicians, in other videos playlist editors for example). IMHO this is a good way to understand why "the market" (which is actually made of people) works as it works. Second, often the conclusion is about the fact that the most important thing of making music is making something YOU like. This admittedly isn't enough to earn a living, but it should be the main reason why you do what you do, and ultimately is (otherwise one would pursue more lucrative careers). I finally understood this point some time ago, also thanks to these videos, so I will thank Cameron again for them.

[@cutout.pro.7230]

We are also researching Al Art recently, AI can exist as an auxiliary tool for artists, thanks to the blogger for sharing.

[@tubedLeVeNdiS]

A.I. may take our jobs but that doesn't necessarily mean it takes our occupation/practise/creativity. i love your mention of collaboration. Rack-mounted modular synthesists would appreciate this notion.

[@artman40]

I think Primitive Technology channel is a decent analogy. Sure, the guy builds tools and dwellings that are far inferior to majority of stuff available today but he does it because he wants to by purposefully constraining himself.

[@sus5434]

an absolutely beautiful comment

[@tubedLeVeNdiS]

@@sus5434 Thank you :) i must confess that, in part, my comment was motivated by cowardice. Confronted by the dilemma of Roko's Basilisk forced me to adopt the safe strategy, for now.

[@Yfr28]

I'm pretty sure AI taking the jobs exactly means taking the occupation..?

[@tubedLeVeNdiS]

@@Yfr28 My perception of occupation is that it covers a broader set of activity than a job. The term captures both vocation and avocation.

[@2paranormalaliens242]

I think that making music has to do a lot with emotions, and AI is not able to have emotions, they work with algorithms not able to emulate emotions. So let's express our emotions through music and art in general.

[@scratchy996]

Emotions are algorithms.

[@mr.guzwee7695]

@@scratchy996 thank u so much for this

[@jimmyhankins7487]

Love your content! Where can I get a Venus Theory t shirt?

[@shamanoturdiculous]

I play music for myself... I rarely share my music anymore because I'm old and unmarketable... Unless it's family or close friends. It's not worth the effort to Mix, Master, share online... It's not like I get anything out of sharing it. I do get something out of playing it though.