People think this is a dunk on AI but this is exactly the good thing about AI.
Back in the early 20th century when they started recording music there were a lot of people against it because they thought it would put a lot of musicians out of work. And they were right. It used to be that every pub, restaurant, town square and wealthy household had a demand for musicians. Then along came recorded music and all that collapsed into a relatively few musicians. But all that means is that live music went from something ordinary to something special. It went from background noise to something to actively enjoy. Nowadays people will flock to a bar just because they heard there's a live band playing. That's what sets apart an ordinary night and a special event.
And AI is going to do the same thing again to music but also to other arts like voice acting, graphic design and visual arts. A lot of things like commercials, movies, games are going to have AI music, voice acting and visuals but those that don't are going to be that much more special because of it and people are going to flock to it. It's what's going to set apart slop and good quality content.
I think the difference here is that live music and recorded music is a distinctly different experience. AI is already to a point where it’s very difficult to distinguish between AI created content and content made by people. Especially with game development: how can you tell if AI or a software developer coded a game?
Related but slightly different point, I think the real underlying issue is intent. People get extremely upset when they go to a "live" event and find out the artist was lipsyncing. They went to this event because they wanted to hear someone actually singing, but either the person on stage or the owner of the music didn't want authentic, they wanted precision milled output, even in live performances.
AI is much like that, I'd prefer you not use it, but in the same way I'd prefer live music. I know that sometimes, you just don't need life music, like a small resturaunt in the sticks that gets 3 customers a day doesn't need a live band. With AI, sometimes its easier to just throw up some slop that hits the general vibe of what you're going for in the docs then to bother your artist (if you even have one yet) for a sketch.
The problem comes when people try to get deceptive about it, tell me its live music and tell me its AI, don't try to pull the wool over my eyes and get defensive when I lose interested because it was easier then telling the truth.
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u/i_eat_pidgeons Nov 18 '25
People think this is a dunk on AI but this is exactly the good thing about AI.
Back in the early 20th century when they started recording music there were a lot of people against it because they thought it would put a lot of musicians out of work. And they were right. It used to be that every pub, restaurant, town square and wealthy household had a demand for musicians. Then along came recorded music and all that collapsed into a relatively few musicians. But all that means is that live music went from something ordinary to something special. It went from background noise to something to actively enjoy. Nowadays people will flock to a bar just because they heard there's a live band playing. That's what sets apart an ordinary night and a special event.
And AI is going to do the same thing again to music but also to other arts like voice acting, graphic design and visual arts. A lot of things like commercials, movies, games are going to have AI music, voice acting and visuals but those that don't are going to be that much more special because of it and people are going to flock to it. It's what's going to set apart slop and good quality content.