This is a half-formed thought but ... the panic about AI taking jobs from creatives feels more of an indictment of (American) capitalism than a threat to any concept of "art". AI slop on Spotify only matters because the recording industry hasn't had a business model since 1998.
The job portion is certainly true. I don't think AI slop on Spotify is only threatening to the record industry's model (which you could argue hasn't changed since Baraka was reading it for precisely what it was in Blues People, which could easily be about the 1990s, 2000s, and beyond if you only switched the genres and formats covered). I think it's dangerous because it is confusing to undiscerning consumers, it crowds out art created by humans (and even humans using AI in interesting, challenging, or truly imaginative ways). Unfortunately, I think we're long since past a time when it's easy to disentangle notions of art and commerce. Even definitions of legitimate art before AI entered the picture tend to prove slippery and subject to the eye of the beholder. A glut of generative works that seem like human creations when you squint, but don't hold up to prolonged scrutiny could be good for actually highlighting "hand made" art in the long run and also reinforce some less capitalistic definitions. While I can hope for that, I also imagine that AI music with smoothed edges that amalgamates and imitates the most discernible characteristics of famous bands and genres will, unfortunately, influence what other human beings choose to make by its very presence in playlists and social media feeds.
This is a half-formed thought but ... the panic about AI taking jobs from creatives feels more of an indictment of (American) capitalism than a threat to any concept of "art". AI slop on Spotify only matters because the recording industry hasn't had a business model since 1998.
This piece also really gets to some of my fears: https://substack.com/home/post/p-166902584?selection=6eb9adeb-2468-4fc9-a9de-ba37ee4b2d6a#:~:text=Without%20attribution%2C%20consent%20and%20remuneration%20though%2C%20generative%20AI%20can%20accelerate%20and%20automate%20value%20extraction%2C%20making%20it%20possible%20to%20replicate%20the%20style%20of%20a%20culture%20without%20ever%20needing%20to%20engage%20with%20the%20people%20who%20created%20it
The job portion is certainly true. I don't think AI slop on Spotify is only threatening to the record industry's model (which you could argue hasn't changed since Baraka was reading it for precisely what it was in Blues People, which could easily be about the 1990s, 2000s, and beyond if you only switched the genres and formats covered). I think it's dangerous because it is confusing to undiscerning consumers, it crowds out art created by humans (and even humans using AI in interesting, challenging, or truly imaginative ways). Unfortunately, I think we're long since past a time when it's easy to disentangle notions of art and commerce. Even definitions of legitimate art before AI entered the picture tend to prove slippery and subject to the eye of the beholder. A glut of generative works that seem like human creations when you squint, but don't hold up to prolonged scrutiny could be good for actually highlighting "hand made" art in the long run and also reinforce some less capitalistic definitions. While I can hope for that, I also imagine that AI music with smoothed edges that amalgamates and imitates the most discernible characteristics of famous bands and genres will, unfortunately, influence what other human beings choose to make by its very presence in playlists and social media feeds.