Accessible art - a technological eulogy

Many AI tools claim to 'democratise' art. A funny notion, considering art is the most human form of expression since ancient times...

Image generated by an actual bot. No humans have been forced to draw this. I swear!

I’m a Sci-Fi/ Fantasy writer who’s had the misfortune of working in corporations for the majority of my youth. To say the experience has been soul crushing would be an insult to the meaning of the phrase.

Still, nothing could beat the advent of AI and my one colleague who asked - ‘oh, so you’re a writer? You must make great use of AI to help speed up your writing/ editing?’

I have not been blessed with a poker face, so I’m sure my speechless stare spoke volumes to her. The thing is, I remember her own face. She was confused. Not apologetic, not introspective, not even wondering she might’ve said something wrong. No. She was just confused about my reaction.

I guess to many people who don’t practice art, writing a short story or a novel chapter or a song is just a task to be done. Just something people do. And people always want to make their tasks easier, right? Right?

Democratising art!

I mean, that’s the biggest sales pitch, isn’t it? We’re democratising art! No longer should the skills belong to the skillful or the talents belong to the talented.

Now, for a small (yet ever increasing) fee you can pretend to be talented too!

But see, that’s the thing… It takes talent, to have talent… And I know, I know a lot of you are coming at me in the comments with your “hard work” pitchforks, but I promise you, you can work as hard as you want, if there is no talent for your work to develop, you won’t go very far.

What I mean by “it takes talent, to have talent” is that when you’re a visual artist, a painter or animator you have this instinct for what looks good, you understand colour theory, you know how to make even the most mundane image pop.

Same with writing - when you’ve torn so many of the same words out of your pen or keyboard in the middle of the night, you start to learn that words may be the same, but the meaning subtly changes and varies and even in writing, tone is incredibly important.

But if you’re just some jackass with a few free AI tokens who thinks they could be an overnight artist, well… That’s how you get the most horrifying, soul-dead and brain-rotting images and bits of text known to humanity.

This is the sort of horrifying bs I’m talking about… The ironic part? This is the cover for a BG fantasy writers’ support group. Kill. Me. Now.

So, I’m sorry boos - you can’t purchase talent, not even in the age of AI. If anything, the age of AI is going to make real human talent and art even more precious and valuable. Wanna know why? Because people are already sick and tired of this generic, bland, over-polished slop.

Because art is a way for the human soul to express itself. Art has been the driving force behind pretty much all of human development, including a lot of science throughout the ages, so trust me when I say - no bot can ever replace an artist, it’s just never going to happen.

So how about we get the bots to do something actually useful, instead of something they can never achieve?

Why are tech bros trying to automate art

An acquaintance of mine who is a movie director and also an improv theatre instructor recently told me AI is going to replace a lot of artists soon. He claimed that AI is quite adept at writing jokes for example.

When I told him I believe AI can only ever re-hash old material and is not really capable of true originality, he countered that humans re-hash the old into the new as well.

I guess that’s the main belief of most tech bros pushing AI down our throats. Most of them seem to think human beings are little more than carbon-based computer systems with a knack for pattern-seeking and ultimately - pattern-replication.

But if that were the case, wouldn’t many of the modern-day technological marvels we have all taken for granted never come to fruition? What pattern were we replicating when creating the computer? How about the washing machine?

The simple fact is, AI is still vastly behind humans in abstract reasoning, the thing that keeps human intelligence flexible enough that it can apply known patterns and references to new contexts and problems. Otherwise known as “creativity” or “creative problem-solving”.

And you see, therein lies the problem for our technocrat overlords - if there is something unique in humans which cannot be automated by a machine, you need to still hire and pay humans to work for you. Bad deal, when you’re a sociopathic wealth horder, innit?

So no wonder they’re pushing so hard for AI to take over, especially in the areas where humans still dominate - the arts, the complex sciences, etc.

Tech stopped solving problems

When I was working on my first ever tech startup circa 2015-2016, I remember all the talks from enterpreneurs, VCs and our startup coaches being something like “tech is here to solve problems”, “what problem are you solving?”, why is your innovation useful, etc.

We would spend hours in front of literal drawing boards thinking up problem statements, figuring out user and customer personas and what their pain points might be so that we could solve them.

Looking at the current tech landscape however, it would appear this whole exercise is fast becoming a lost art.

Years of U.S. and Western government deregulation and seemingly endless funding have resulted in the creation of monsters like Amazon, Meta, Microsoft and many others who have spent the majority of their most influential time on the market aggregating power and engaging in almost full-on cartel activities to push out competition at all cost. And somewhere amidst those years, these companies which were once cited as breakthrough innovators, market disruptors, lost their creative edge.

Some might say this was inevitable, since even the most patient investor would want to see their money return and grow and that’s a sentiment not too compatible with the notion of “moving fast and breaking things”.

So instead of solving problems, these tech behemoths are now engaged in a race to the very bottom of the barrel, scraping to see how much of a bigger, shittier hole they can dig for their users and customers.

It is in this climate of anti-innovation that AI emerges. It’s not really solving any problems - worker efficiency has skyrocketed since the 80s to largerly stagnant wages, but impressive stakeholder and exec level compensation and returns… But it’s not even marketing itself as a worker productivity tool. It’s marketing itself as a worker replacement tool.

Let’s see how that’s been going, shall we? It would seem many companies are re-hiring employees laid off due to “AI-related restructuring”. Looks like customers can tell when they’re talking to a bot/ reading AI slop on a business’ page and they hate it.

The funniest part? The same puritanical “you-have-to-work-hard” mindset that has helped capitalism sink its talons into the hearts and minds of so many people the world over is the very same reason we now hate AI. Because it’s lazy. Because it’s rude. Because it means whoever uses it doesn’t care that much about the result. Because they didn’t work hard for it.

So I’m sorry, tech bros, you’re going to have to go back to the literal drawing board and start asking yourselves the question “why is this innovation useful?”, “what problem does this solve” and get back to understanding and solving actual user and customer pain points. AI just isn’t going to cut it for you.

Conclusion

At the end of the day, like it or hate it, AI is here to stay. But we do have a say in what it is being used for and how.

Show your displeasure with it, do not like or engage with posts on socials, clearly generated by AI. Support real art, done by real humans - subscribe to that writer or digital artist you’ve been following for a while. Trust me, it helps!

I firmly believe that, bleak as things look at the moment, ultimately AI will prove to be the best thing that happened to the arts - it would make real art even more valuable and highly appreciated. And much to many tech bros chagrin, it would make artists even harder to replace with a simple machine.

Thanks for reading, drop me a comment with your thoughts on AI “art” and see you in the next one!