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Comment by joenot443 | Hacker News Reader

Considering the list is made up of names like Bon Jovi and Nicki Minaj, I'm not THAT concerned about their livelihoods. They could never a single penny for the rest of their lives and they'd still remain unfathomably richer than the average American.

It might be controversial in some circles, but I'm of the opinion that the best music being recorded these days is not being done by people seeking millions. It's being recorded by people who have something interesting and novel they'd like to express, and very, very occasionally they'll see a financial reward.

I say this as someone who has thousands of Spotify/Apple Music plays on my piano albums and zero motivation to ever seek any kind of reward from it.

Making art is different from making money, I don't think that's a bad thing.

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The bigger issue is if I run my machine learning bot on your piano albums, and then reuse that music.

It's technically not yours anymore, and I can license the music out to whoever I want.

I think a good middle ground would be to immediately put all AI generated art in the public domain. I'd love to be able to just ask Chat GPT 5 to recreate The Chronic in French or Straight out of Compton in Japanese.

But the issue is I shouldn't be able to sell that content as if it's a result of my work.

Honestly many of those artists didn't reach fame because they were such brilliant singers or composers. They were also not bad, but their strong point was building an image, performing live and gathering a large fanbase.

You could sample their music for all you want but it would never sell anywhere near the originals.

To be fair, this is no different than what's done by a human artist. Virtually every song composed today is inspired by or based on, in some manner or other, a previous work of art.

This is exactly what machine learning does - a novel recombination of what has been previously observed (ie., "reusing the music" - building upon that which is)

Whether this process is done by a human or not is irrelevant. ML, for the most part, does exactly what humans do.

There are currently very few capabilities which ML performs that humans do not - namely, blatant plagiarism.

People whining about their exact job being done by a machine is as old as time. Farmers, industrial revolution, the printing press (scribes whined), etc.

Nothing new here. New jobs will be created to replace the lost ones. We've arguably been in a "BS economy" for quite some time now.

And to be clearer -- We have licensing mechanisms now in music (they aren't perfect) but when you remix/interpolate/sample the original artist gets their cut.

The "risks" of Machine learning with large models is you won't know who you are even sampling, which exposes you to unknown risk.

This is not true. Google LLMs / multi-modals fully support attribution and as explainability goes up, so will attribution.

And it will be much more fair / accurate than the droves of human artists who intentionally omit attributions.

When a human artist composes a new song, they often have no idea where they got the compound basis for it either.

If anything, human attribution is vastly inferior to ML as-is, nevermind of what's to come.

You're right, but I don't believe the previous poster was talking about sampling.

What happens with machine learning models is more similar to someone learning to play music: everyone learning some form of musical expression will by default learn music which has been written previously, and this can't but help to influence them to a degree.

Of course, there are systems to police this too, but high profile cases in recent years have shown how imperfect (or difficult?) this is in reality [0].

[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NcCKlsTgjeM

True, but nothing could ever be done so quickly and at such a large scale.

If an Italian band wants to make something inspired by Pink Floyd it's going to take real effort. Not a 30 second click to generate.

Eventually, and this is probably my biggest fear with AI, is the AI generated noise will crowd out real human innovation. I don't feel that AI generated art should have the same protections that human generated art has.

> AI generated noise will crowd out real human innovation

But that’s the key point, “real human innovation” will still be there because by definition that’s not going to be in some model weights based on previous works. If it’s truly innovative, AI won’t be able to duplicate that.

Personally, I don't think the amount of effort is what's important. If Roger Waters, or "his people", sniff out something fishy, they're going to sue and they're going to get something for their troubles. I think what's important is that that legal option is uniquely available to him because he's already rich. If someone rips me off, it doesn't matter if they're working with a trained ear or AI. There's nothing I can do about it cause I can't afford a lawyer.

There should be a better legal framework for us regular folk who don't have these resources, regardless of AI. A better framework probably includes what you're saying about AI generated things, but there's no reason for it to stop there.

If we outsource the job of art-making to bots, what will remain for humans to do? Given that there are so many jobs that involve real drudgery, it’s odd to me that we’re trying so hard to automate the fun/rewarding/creative parts, while leaving the difficult, repetitive, mind-numbing parts to humans.

That's an economic problem to be solved just like the printing press and the industrial revolution. Like I said, we've been in a BS economy for a while now.

I think this is probably because interesting jobs require handling information, which computers are good at, and boring ones require just shuffling stuff around in the physical world, which computers are still mediocre at.

But, designing a robot that can do tedious tasks is an intellectual job, just a really hard one. If we automate intellectual jobs to the point where, like, any random team of 10 people with engineering degrees can make a really good robot, I guess we should see the tedious jobs taken too.

I used to work as an architect. As far as I am aware, AI/automation has so far only made inroads in the earliest "concept" phases--image-making, concept massing, conceptual space-planning, etc. That is only the first, shortest, and most creative part of designing a building. After the concept design has finished, there are longer and more expensive phases of design development and construction drawing that still require huge amounts of coordination between the various design/construction professionals & stakeholders. At this phase, the work is much more practical: adding detail to the drawings reveals that, say, the size of the required mechanical units exceed the area that originally been allocated to them in the concept phase, and the architect will need to work with the structural engineer/mechanical engineer/client/etc. to modify the solution so that the building still works. It's this latter phase of drawing/coordinating/redrawing that has so far been very resistant to automation.

I would still call this part of an architect's job "intellectual work". My guess is that it hasn't been automated because it requires deep domain knowledge in multiple areas...knowledge which your typical AI software person doesn't have.

What kind of "art work" is being AI'd? Art itself can be repetitive and mind numbing. I'd like some artists to weigh in, if they exist here.

It seems like in many people's minds art is something that comes from within. An idea pops into a brain; you ascend to the clouds. There it is, clear as day: YOUR IDEA. All you have to do is collect it and take it down to earth to sell... of course I don't have to pay you! You didn't have to do any REAL work. You're basically running through the fields catching butterflies. Seems like a common misconception about art.

The reality of art to me seems like it can be just as drudgy as doing the dishes, spreadsheets, or digging ditches. It seems like this is where we're seeing AI used the most?

It's interesting to see famous songwriters weigh in, many of which are likely glorified producers. From what, I understand this has sort of already happened to musicians, with the invent of DAWs and other tooling, even earlier versions of AI.

Wondering if they're finally coming for the engineers and producers. Actually these celeb artists will probably already be fine. They'll just pay their people to use AI, instead of paying session musicians and producers.

Two problems here:

1. If a human does that, they can be sued for doing so. If the reuse is egregious enough they will lose in court.

2. Industrial farming and industrial production have in fact been some of the more contentious economic projects. And the results have often been a race to the bottom in terms of quality.

> To be fair, this is no different than what's done by a human artist.

Scale matters. It's like the difference between a cop sitting on the side of a road writing down the cars he sees on a pad of paper versus cameras plastered everywhere tracking every individual with ML software. You could say the computers are just doing the same thing as the human, but one is fairly benign while the other enables a totalitarian surveillance state.

Purely AI driven art is already defacto public domain in the US in that it is not copyrightable. See https://www.theverge.com/2022/2/21/22944335/us-copyright-off...

There is a spectrum of what AI generated means. At one end is simply photoshopped pictures. In many cases these were touched by AI, in that some algorithm decided on the specific pixels, but the image was largely directed by a person and is generally considered copyrightable.

On the other end is the uncopyrightable case where a person just typed in a prompt and out comes art.

Where the line is in between has yet to be decided. What if I spend hours tweaking an image generated initally by an AI. At what point does it become copyrightable? What if I spend hours creating a complex graph? That's similar to source code of a computer program, and the output of compilers is protected... From the other direction, at what point does something copyrightable manipulated by AI lose it's protected status?

That ruling doesn't say that AI driven art is not copyrightable

I tried to explain that AI was ruled not copyrightable if a human wasn't meaningfully involved. Meaningfully involved being a bit blurry, with art generated from a prompt being the only explict thing so far ruled not copyrightable. Do you have a different take?

My impression is that in all these rulings, the humans doing the filings go out of their way to claim that the author was the AI or machine or animal ("machine" thereafter), or the owner of the patent or copyright is the machine, or the plaintiff in a copyright court filing is the machine. With usually the human acting on behalf of the machine, or the machine transfering their copyright to the human, etc. They have an agenda which is NOT about generating art mechanically. It's more about "machine personhood light" - perhaps as a first step to full machine personhood.

These people are not trying to "copyright AI-generated stuff", they are trying to make a legal person of the machine. And the copyright office or the courts are not ready to go there - certainly not for a BS copyright claim. In this 2022 ruling, the human further goes out of their way to provide a note saying they didn't have anything to do with it! - they just want to own the copyright on the "work of authorship of the machine".

So anyway, I don't think any of these rulings preclude a human clicking five times in a generative AI tool (basically just logging in and saving one image they choose out of a dozen - perhaps even saying "I will claim the first image" before logging in) and then filing for copyright protection - as long they they claim human authorship. That is, none of these rulings seem to demand significant human intervention in the use of a tool, as long it is filed with the human as the author and copyright owner and financially impacted entity (for a court filing). And this would be consistent with the art world view that art is whatever the (self-described) artist says is art. That is, anyone can call themselves an artist, and then by definition if they say they created something and that this something is art then it's art. And they certainly don't need to do any of the manual work themselves - that's what assistants, contractors, dumb luck etc are there for.

It's possible that there will be eventually some ruling that "more human intervention" is needed but I haven't seen that. There has been mention of "element of human creativity needed" but - as far as I can tell - not in a clean case where there wasn't some other agenda or shenanigans going on.

>not THAT concerned about their livelihoods

Some (actually, most, now I read more) of these artists are well-known for their mentorship and community efforts, I'd like to take the kinder approach and assume they are using their powerful voices to support those artists who don't have such power.

Probably true for some. But:

> "When used irresponsibly, AI poses enormous threats to our ability to protect our privacy, our identities, our music and our livelihoods," the open letter states.

Note it says "our" not "the young artists and communities that we mentor and support".

The statement is not by Billie Eilish, Pearl Jam, etc. though. It's by the Artist Rights Alliance, which is itself a community. Feels like we're splitting hairs to suggest young artists aren't included just because they weren't specifically called out.

Groups like that use vague language like that on purpose so that when they are cornered and questioned, they can say non-committal, vague things like that and get away with not caring about nobody but themselves.

So yes, if they really mean protecting the community along with young artists, they have to explicitly and clearly state it to be believable.

The voices of popular/wealthy musicians reach further than most of the other people making music, so I appreciate them for this, even if it might be selfishly motivated.

What will it take to get to a point where people can make art independently of livelihood?

> What will it take to get to a point where people can make art independently of livelihood?

We're already there. I've made hundreds of songs in my life and haven't earned a penny. It's all good.

What do you do to make money?

I have a normal job, like 99.9% of all musicians.

> What will it take to get to a point where people can make art independently of livelihood?

Did you finish reading my comment? I'm the exact person you're talking about. I've never made a cent from any of my art, yet I plan to continue making music until the day I die.

Reading the open letter, I don't think they are concerned with AI compositions dominating the charts. The open letter mentions "massive quantities of AI-created 'sounds' and 'images' that substantially dilute the royalty pools" and "We must protect against the predatory use of AI to steal professional artist' voices and likenesses, violate creators' rights, and destroy the music ecosystem."

So I think the more realistic threats are things like: Generating drum samples instead of buying them. Generating jingles/ads instead of hiring a composer. Spoofing a famous person's voice/likeness for some promotional blurb instead of paying them.

It's hard to do art when you don't have a roof over your head. It takes a long time to master an art. Time that could be used at work instead.

If doing art is no longer a viable career path then only the children of the rich will be able to pursue it.

That's basically how it is today. Making money off of art seems to be primarily driven by networking. So the rich are already more likely to break out in the business since they have connections. I don't think I know any middle or lower class parents encouraging thier kids to pursue music or art as a career.

Art has never really be a viable career path except for the exceptionally talented and lucky few.

With YouTube and other social media, it's probably never been better.

I'm not interested in AI art, and feel that the defintion of art should be "created by a human" but I'm sure many don't care.

Whether something is "art" or not is kind of separate from whether it can be sold as a product. I would love it if software could generate, for example, an infinite number of episodes of my favorite TV show from the 90s, so long as the generated stories/plots were convincingly indistinguishable from the "genuine" show with real actors. Does that count as Real Art™ according to the art police? Who knows? Would I buy it? Yes.

That sounds like a fitting definition of art.

I do think it is a viable career path though: Maybe you won't make things with 100% freedom 100% of the time, but you can apply the skills built for your art in profitable endeavors. I know a few artists making their living as designers for example. I don't think I know any _rich_ artists that aren't incredibly talented and/or lucky, but it's not about being either rich or poor.

Now with LLMs recycling existing content, less of those skills might be needed so there is a risk that it _will_ become about being either rich or poor. That, I find tragic.

> Art has never really be a viable career path except for the exceptionally talented and lucky few.

Yes, and also, I think it's a larger group than you're thinking.

Photography is art. Tattooing is art. There are probably a lot more working artists than you think there are. It's true that for most artists, art isn't economically sustainable, but there's a spectrum; Billie Eilish is at one end and a software engineer who sketches their own D&D characters on weekends is at the other.

>Considering the list is made up of names like Bon Jovi and Nicki Minaj, I'm not THAT concerned about their livelihoods. They could never a single penny for the rest of their lives and they'd still remain unfathomably richer than the average American.

And you think anyone would listen or gather the opinion of the litany of unknown artists out there? Like, yes, its important that people who are well-known voice themselves on subjects like this.

I, too, have made albums (at my expense) and also believe the best art is coming from names most people have never heard.

But that doesn't mean other artists don't deserve protection from exploitative streaming services and music venue monopolies. Tech bros and LiveNation would happily cannibalize the music industry for immediate profit, if they could.

It's rather snobbish and self-centered to declare that musicians don't deserve protections from corporate greed, just because of your tastes and/or it doesn't have an impact on your hobby.

AI is a threat to Billie Eilish and Pearl Jam's livelihood?

Well, given that Billie Eilish, Pearl Jam, etc, have been more than a threat to MY livelihood as famous rock-star :-) I can sympathize, but frankly, that's just the way it is. You have the right to compete, but you don't have the right to suppress competitors. Being king of the hill isn't a lifetime achievement award.

Now that we don't need artists to create derivative music, perhaps we won't have so much derivative music created. I wish them well, because frankly, it's not just them--everybody is going to have to prove they can be more valuable than an AI.

Behind every millionaire musician is a supporting staff consisting of folks making 5 (or low 6) figures.

At the risk of sounding too "woke", I have to point out that many people are not in the privileged situation of being able to afford to create music, art, or writing without getting a financial reward from it. If they have something interesting or novel to express, they do not have the free time to express it in hopes of a occasional reward.

The list is made of up names tuned for publicity. If they didn't include prominent names Arstechnica probably wouldn't write it up and we probably wouldn't discuss it.

From the Artists Rights Alliance web site [1]:

> We are an alliance of working musicians, performers, and songwriters fighting for a healthy creative economy and fair treatment for all creators in the digital world.

It sounds like a great many of the people you're describing who aren't seeking millions are members of this alliance.

Personally I don't want to live in a world where the only way to produce art is in your spare time, around some other full-time job. I think there's a middle ground where artists are able to earn a living without becoming millionaires. Capitalist society has never come up with a great answer for that but I think this alliance is right to be worried that AI might further deteriorate the possibility.

[1] https://artistrightsalliance.org/about_us

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