Comment by echelon
1 day ago
We're going to be okay.
There are far more good and interesting use cases for this technology. Games will let users clone their voices and create virtual avatars and heroes. People will have access to creative tools that let them make movies and shows with their likeness. People that couldn't sing will make music.
Nothing was more scary than the invention of the nuclear weapon. And we're all still here.
Life will go on. And there will be incredible benefits that come out of this.
I'm not denigrating the tech, all I'm saying is that we've crossed to new territory and there will be consequences that we don't understand from this. The same way that social media has been particularly detrimental to young people (especially women) in a way we were not ready for. This __smells__ like it could be worse, alongside with (or regardless of) the benefits of both.
I simply think people don't really know that the new world requires a new set of rules of engagement for anything that exists behind a screen (for now).
We'll be okay eventually, when society adapts to this and becomes fully aware of the capabilities and the use cases for abuse. But, that may take some time. The parent is right to be concerned about the interim, at the very least.
That said, I am likewise looking forward to the cool things to come out of this.
> We're going to be okay.
> And there will be incredible benefits that come out of this.
Your username is echelon.
I just wanted to point that out.
Yeah. Not using voice, but...https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/white-house-posts-fa...
> Nothing was more scary than the invention of the nuclear weapon. And we're all still here.
Except that building a nuclear weapon was not available to everyone, certainly not to dumb people whose brain have been feeded with social media content.
I usually don't correct typos and/or grammar, but you asked for it. Calling random people "dumb" while using an incorrect past tense is pretty funny. It is "fed", not "feeded"...
> People that couldn't sing will make music.
I was with you, until
But, yeah. Life will go on.
There are plenty of electronic artists who can't sing. Right now they have to hire someone else to do the singing for them, but I'd wager a lot of them would like to own their music end-to-end. I would.
I'm a filmmaker. I've done it photons-on-glass production for fifteen years. Meisner trained, have performed every role from cast to crew. I'm elated that these tools are going to enable me to do more with a smaller budget. To have more autonomy and creative control.
We've had Yamaha Vocaloid for over two decades now, and Synthesizer V is probably coming up on a decade too now. They're like any other synth: MIDI (plus phonemes) in, sound out. It's a tool of musical expression, like any other instrument.
Hatsune Miku (Fujita Saki) is arguably the most prolific singer in the world, if you consider every Vocaloid user and the millions of songs that have come out of it.
So I don't think there's any uncharted territory...we still have singers, and sampled VST instruments didn't stop instrumentalists from existing; if anything, most of these newcomer generative AI tools are far less flexible or creatively useful than the vast array of synthesis tools musicians already use.
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Yes, the flipside of this is that we're eroding the last bit of ability for people to make a living through their art. We are capturing the market for people to live off of making illustrations, to making background music, jingles, promotional videos, photographs, graphic design, and funnelling those earnings to NVIDIA. The question I keep asking is whether we care to value as a society for people to make a living through their art. I think there is a reason to care.
It's not so much of an issue with art for art's sake aided by AI. It's an issue with artistic work becoming unviable work.
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What happens to lyricless electronica if suddenly every electronic artist has quality vocal-backing?
Oh no.
Maybe we did frig this up.
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