Clippy
Since January, artificial intelligence has been getting a ton of attention. From chatGPT to Midjourney, and everything in between we can now say that we are in the age of artificial intelligence. Understanding that change is in the air, I figured I would share some of my thoughts about this technology and how it relates to artists
Siri
Point 1
One of the first topics of conversation about artificial intelligence (which I’ll refer to as ai for convenience) was that it was going to be a replacement for artists. As cool as the tech is it would be a logistical nightmare to do something of that scale. You would have to deal with copyright, unions and more to even begin pursuing that route. On top of that, it wouldn’t make sense to employ ai and prompters when you can have a talented artist… who can also prompt. Technology isn’t a substitute for skill, skill just uses technology to enhance itself
Point 2
On the subject of the logistics are legal implications. In the US there are laws that protect against the use of ai for profit motives. Art is defined as a creative endeavor by humans, and since ai is not a human, the content used from it can not be copyrighted. This presents a massive blow for people wanting to make money off of the technology (because you can’t legally enforce your copyright).
Along with that, due to the justified outcry of artists, there are techniques being developed so ai can’t sample the images with any degree of specificity. This will be a huge blow to developers freely sampling art from creatives who don’t want their art to be part of a data set. This sampling shield will only get better as time goes on, and it may even be interpreted into platforms on the cloud level one day.
Point 3
One of the interesting things about the concept of ai art is that no one seems to have questioned, while developing it: is this genuinely useful? I argue that it’s not only useless (aside from the ego investment of accomplishing the creation of such a tool), but that it’s also fundamentally pointless.
Art isn’t about technology, it is about people, emotions, relationships and the dialogue between the artist and the audience. Surprise surprise, ai can’t do any of that, not because it couldn’t be programmed (though there might be an argument for that), but because no one cares what robots have to say about the human experience. Your favorite art has the voice and story of a person behind it, and that’s what makes art valuable to people.
Point 4
This is the most important point. While the financial and moral questions of ai are still at its infancy, what’s most important for artists is to prepare for the changing landscape. While I understand the limits of the tech, that doesn’t mean CEO’s and business owners will understand that point at the outset. I am fully expecting human greed to take over initially until businesses realize they can’t just prompt away the human element.
It is with this knowledge that I will say with the utmost sense of urgency, that artists use the internet to build their own platforms. Whether it’s on social media, or your own site, or something else: your value as an artist will be linked to how big of an audience you can create for yourself. The expectation of a corporate 9-5 for the rest of your life in the art world is more or less dead, and while it’s not ai that killed it, ai will ensure it’s not possible anymore. Artists will need to prepare for the future by having an audience support them.
Midjourney
Ai is changing every landscape it touches and it’s happening rapidly. While there are people afraid of this, and they are justified in that fear, I believe it is best to take it in good spirits. Like all technology it really depends on how it is applied.
It is not inherently good or bad. It is up to us, the people to make the most of it. Finally, while the potential for the technology is limitless, we must be wary of the potential pitfalls along the way
-Until next time-