Rote, Actually?

Is Artificial Intelligence a misnomer? Is it actually rote learning on a monumental scale? If it is the product of rote, is it creative?

How would you feel if your favorite author, or favorite musician was a mix-and-match machine, rather like a GovX.com "Exquisite Corpse" advertisement (where you see a head of perhaps a nurse, the torso of a firefighter, and the legs of a Navy seal) ?

If you, as a consumer, do not care, what about if you were a competing creator? Or a collector? AI is obviously efficient and fast-to-market, and costs nothing. A print of a masterwork might be similar, but an original has immense value, and a print does not, unless it is a signed, numbered print from a limited series.

I'm thinking of the Pierce Brosnan "Thomas Crown Affair" (which I think is really good, and it has a happier ending --implied-- than does the Steve McQueen "Thomas Crown Affair), and also I'm thinking of "Notting Hill". The former has forgeries and an original, the latter has a --probably legal-- print and the original.

Would museums and art galleries become redundant if everyone could have a reproduction of the world's greatest masterpieces in their home for no cost? Are those places "a good thing"? I think they are. I think that the experience of going to a magnificent building, and admiring something in company with other appreciators of Art... is a good thing for society and for individual sanity and humanity.

While I don't "get" Picasso or Jackson Pollock, I respect that others see great value in their works. I should be sorry if anyone could get a printer attached to AI and verbally request "a Picasso" or "a Jackson Pollock". If that flies, any reader could speak into a printer and ask for "a J. K. Rowling" or "a Shakespeare" or "a Maya Angelou".

For that matter, I don't particularly appreciate my husband's obsession with stripe-art, but because he is/was a famous designer, his private works might be worth something, so I should declare my conflict of interest.

Eric Blair, who wrote as George Orwell, brought fascinating life experience to his writing. He fought in a foreign war as a volunteer (Homage to Catalonia), he served as a colonial law enforcement officer in Burma (Shooting The Elephant), he experienced homelessness (The Road to Wigan Pier) and (Down and Out In London And Paris). How does AI substitute itself for the authenticity of lived experience?

There's a Beatles song, "Now and Then"... but two surviving members of the group were able to manipulate existing recordings to complete a work that was never completed by their band and arguably by one of their most creative members.

That is a very different kettle of fish (apologies for the figure of speech), to the case of the North Carolina musician who recently pleaded guilty to AI-assisted music-streaming fraud. What the accused allegedly did was to use fake songs, and also to create fake fans of those fake songs in order to upgrade his fake listings and thereby deprive legitimate musicians of their rankings, ratings, and percentages of revenue.

The song-streaming services that are alleged to have unwittingly (that is the thing with automated services... no one is to blame on their side) enabled his fraud are Spotify, Apple Music, Amazon Music... and more.

This North Carolina "musician" claimed (presumably under oath) that he could get more than 660,000 plays per day, worth perhaps $1,000,000 a year in royalties,

As EFF writes:

"This is part of a growing problem regarding artificial intelligence-created music. The Rolling Stone report explained that this harms flesh-and-blood artists because streaming services pay them from a shared pool based on total plays. This means Smith’s fake songs “stole millions in royalties that should have been paid to musicians, songwriters, and other rights holders whose songs were legitimately streamed.”

Some experts estimate that as much as 10 percent of all streams could be fake, which costs the industry billions of dollars per year. "

So, if you want to listen to Bob Seger, or Eric Clapton, or Dire Straits, or David Bowie, or the Highwaymen, do you want to listen to them, or to something rote, actually?

All the best,

Rowena Cherry. Space Snark