History also proves that when people band together things can actually change for the better. All this cynical "it is what it is" rethoric is so damned tiresome.
Honestly can't remember when that happened though, especially when it comes to consumer products and services. And with companies being able to slash off expenses.
Like I said, even though there were condemnation at the start with sweat shops, terrible labor practices, shady material sources… people didn't stop buying tech and clothes made from them. All companies like Apple, Nike, Nestle, Amazon had similar controversies before. They didn't care then, they sure won't care now. And they've just been chugging along just fine, and most people still patronize their products.
Would you honestly stop using social media just because they're using AI in their code or having everything you post on them being scraped for training for their own models? Most wouldn't even consider dropping them.
They would still use their electronics made with batteries from lithium mined by minors, they would still wear their levi's, shein's & nike's made from sweatshops. People would cry out loud against amazon and their anti-union rules, but are still eagerly awaiting their next prime delivery package.
Therein lies the hypocrisy of the common man.
Would be glad to be proven wrong from my cynical views, but things actually reversing like that are either few and far between and often only temporary until the heat dies down.
Am old enough to remember when a lot of our consumer electronics were actually repairable, when software were one-time payments and not subscriptions, when buying something means actually owning the item and not some weird lease to use agreement.
But you don't see them going away anytime soon, do you? Neither do companies.
It only hurts people when it´s their own business which is in danger or affected,
otherwise people go with the flow and don´t care.
How much do you think people care and band together for musicians, studio musicians, producers, recording engineers,
small and big record labels and the people who work there, record shops etc.,
they all say "it is what it is"
Coming out of my cave a bit, I wanna drop my view about Gen AI because I wanna get this out. In the wake of what is going on with NaNoWriMo at the moment, I mostly lean on the negative side. Don't get me wrong, there are some uses for it but at the current state, unless there are regulations. It is going to be a constant issue.
Talking about in a writer's view, I know when I experimented with Gen AI stories ( never posted them) just to see how good the tech is. Each test story I put it through, it felt like it's not a story that I would write or feels mine. Unless you kept on generating different outcomes, it felt more time-consuming rather than if you just wrote yourself. Plus, it would not help you understand your characters and lore. To put it simple, you can't really call it your story if just press the button and generate it. It's not enough to generate the story. You have to understand it inside and out.
That's just in my opinion. The artist's side is probably the same view. You can make the "perfect" AI art, story, or music. But it will never feel like yours at all. It takes away the sense of process and accomplishment.
Using AI to write your stories or create your art is like putting a Joe Satriani CD in the player and saying that you’ve created music.
It did happen in history, people went on strikes when their business was affected
and you are just proving my point that people don´t care about it and you just said
"it is what it is" to me with your comment and showed me that you don´t care
no coz my issue is what feels like an acceptance and loss of fight. like okay it didn't work out but why not keep at it. to say it didn't work it's never gonna seems dumb or at the least counterproductive. i'd rather keep making art in whatever way i can till i die than just go "ah well this exists now so guess there's no point' coz even prior to ai there's still the whole "oh well there's always someone better than you" and even in those instances i still kept at it out of pure spite and determination to prove that i and the things i care about are worth a damn.
i'm not trying to talk down but i hate the defeatist mindset that keeps cycling around and cant wrap my head around the idea of quitting coz something went wrong. i'm literally already actively in a phase where i once again hate everything i'm making and am constantly questioning if i even wanna keep at it even tho i loathe the idea of being stuck in some other job i hate so even tho i struggle with things like visibility or getting any kind of finance from i art i refuse to just drop it because "other people or a computer can do it better"
maybe its coz so much of the media i consumed growing up insisted on never quitting till all options have genuinely been exhausted and that it aint over till your heart stops beating but i refuse to bend to the mindset of it is what it is coz yeah life sucks but what can i do but keep on pushing and if i can get that concept through at least a few thick skulls than maybe that makes the effort worth a damn
I´ll never give up until I die, I have been making music and drawing since 41 years,
first live concert in 1983 and that was also the year I started drawing.
I always fight my way through but I´m also a realist, there is no banding together
well i guess that just makes me the irritating optimist coz that mindset sounds draining and lonely but if its your path good luck
Writers and actors went on strike just this past year and instead of showing solidarity the public lost their shit because their TV shows got delayed.
At it bloodiest, the labour movement was only fought by the people most affected. Everyone else thought the protestors were being inappropriate.
The American state of Oklahoma passed a law that protects anyone who drives down a protestor blocking traffic.
Those are just a few examples. It'd be great if the public would show some sort of solidarity for their peers. Even the truth that labour's win is also their win does not sway them. The public simply can't be trusted to show good judgement, and that means their politicians are even more selfish, cruel and stupid.
It's sensible to see all fights for societal improvement as small scale and largely futile because history shows this to be the norm.
What is the optimistic message?
My optimistic message is that I have found my niche and that kids still love to draw with pencil
and paper and that I found a way to keep on making music. I achieved that through my hard
work and made the impossible possible. There was no banding toether involved
Pff it's like with the US elections. The average person would rather believe the news at face value than dig deeper and do research, or directly watch the full campaign speeches from both parties. Studying is too poopy!
Admittedly I don't care as much about Gen AI as the mass majority of artists, but it's because I'm using optimistic nihilism for survival. If I weren't bogged down by two jobs and 4 hours of sleep during the work week, housework, pet care, I probably would have time to care more, since my stuff can get stolen too. (Probably has, wouldn't be surprised.) Still, I do understand the fears and hatred everyone else has, especially artists whose livelihoods have been threatened thanks to AI.
youre talking to a black woman who lives in the southern us if you think i'm ignorant to reality by way of blind optimism then thats quite the assumption to make. i'm not ignorant to any of these realities or the consistent lynchings the recent murders or anything else going on. i'm actively following the animation guilds ongoing strike loosely kept track of what was going on with actors and have been painfully aware of the realities of my own personal struggles but the simple fact is despite it all i'd like to try and hold onto some kind of hope that maybe just maybe shit can get better but if i'm going to have to deal with people still talking down at me perhaps it'd be in my best interest to forgo speaking here in general permanently
While generative AI may assist in writing / proofreading / coding or other areas, when it comes to creativity (writing, art or animation), I am completely against the notion of using computer-generated ideas that (at least in part) replace human creativity.
Example: while AI might help artists / webcomic artists generate stories, the stories would feel off at some point because they lack the intricacies of human emotion. Instead of leveraging AI, I rather like the idea of writers/ artists racking their brains and coming up with stories that show pure human brilliance and the full creative credit goes to the human.
I myself rarely use AI. And I do hate it when AI generates 'art' by pulling and amalgamating various patterns from real artists.
I usually just block people when I see continued interaction as pointless. But that option isn't available here so walking away is a valid option IMO. Good luck with your next message board.
Ho yeah! It's like that with almost everything, the average person genuinely doesn't care about suffrage unless they're the one suffering. Or at least most are oblivious and ignorant to it until they're suffering, it's an animal instinct thing that requires rewiring/empathy training to get out of your system. Not saying our species is apathetic, by default we have SOME empathy, but educated empathy takes effort... sometimes through experience, unfortunately.
Did you stop ordering from amazon because of how they treat their workers, and not allowing to unionize though? Stopped buying clothes and brands made from sweatshops in some third-world country? Are you going to stop from using social media because they're using AI to code, replacing jobs, and scrape all your posts for training data?
Sure, some people may have switched away from Adobe products because of the AI controversy. I personally switched out from them ages ago ever since they went subscription, after v6- early CS days. I made my choice, but that doesn't mean I haven't acknowledged that they're the industry standard still, and that the tools am currently using are niche products in comparison. A lot of people are mad over Adobe's stance on AI but are still using their suite instead of taking the time to learn the alternatives.
Am just being a realist. Most people say they'll the fight the good fight, but like everyone else, they don't have the strength of their convictions… especially when it inconveniences them.
It's amusing to expect that strangers and society in general will change, when they themselves can't even sacrifice the things they use.