1,000 artist protest against AI

[TheGreek]

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/feb/25/kate-bush-damon-albarn-1000-artists-silent-ai-protest-album-copyright?fbclid=IwY2xjawIqkbZleHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHakDEt9tIDNPZx-rirNBhgmmS4-v799s9kfITyrn5kKm1WOuCv5q1gVrIg_aem_RYVk_27_W8af5uyJKay5lQ

[edstraker123]

I was enjoying playing with Udio and making some cool tunes in it until I listened to another members generated track which was trending. The vocals on it were clearly those of Stacey Kent - if you know of her you will know what a distinctive voice she has.  That did it for me and I cancelled my membership. Using existing work to train a model is bad enough but to then use actual voices in finished songs is appalling. If all artists opt out where will this leave them ?

[tegs07]

I am not sure what can be done about this. When the general public would rather watch a second rate YouTuber fight an old man we are probably approaching the point of no return.

 

I vaguely remember something said by Baudrillard about the century closing with the image of someone masturbating to TV static and we are approaching this point.

[Dan Dare]

AI seems to be just another thing to get worked up about. I've never seen/heard any AI generated art or music that wasn't sh1te -  limp non-melodies, trite lyrics, derivative arrangements (how could they not be?), etc. It may fool some people, but only those who wouldn't know art if it bit them in the behind and they are probably beyond saving. There's nothing we can do about it, so why get upset?

Edited February 25 by Dan Dare

[tegs07]

3 minutes ago, Dan Dare said:

AI seems to be just another thing to get worked up about. I've never seen/heard any AI generated art or music that wasn't sh1te -  limp non-melodies, trite lyrics, derivative arrangements (how could they not be?), etc. It may fool some people, but only those who wouldn't know art if it bit them in the behind and they are probably beyond saving. There's nothing we can do about it, so why get upset?

The getting upset part is mostly down to creatives losing income. It’s happening a lot already in the voice over world.

[Maude]

1 hour ago, tegs07 said:

... the image of someone masturbating to TV static 

 

Sod AI, I think someone's hacked into my home CCTV. 😬

[Burns-bass]

2 hours ago, tegs07 said:

The getting upset part is mostly down to creatives losing income. It’s happening a lot already in the voice over world.

And in copywriting and content, in which I work.

[tegs07]

3 minutes ago, Burns-bass said:

And in copywriting and content, in which I work.

It’s encroaching into tech as well, particularly support roles. The concept being AI can suggest fixes based on search terms and historical data. I suspect the reality being frustrated users and even more sluggish productivity.

[Burns-bass]

2 hours ago, tegs07 said:

It’s encroaching into tech as well, particularly support roles. The concept being AI can suggest fixes based on search terms and historical data. I suspect the reality being frustrated users and even more sluggish productivity.

As a consumer, I despise AI.

[SimonK]

Let me try posting my AI song here - no one else seems to be appreciating how brilliant it is - mostly because it took only two programmes and about twenty minutes to produce!!

 

 

 

Edited February 25 by SimonK

[SH73]

15 hours ago, SimonK said:

Let me try posting my AI song here - no one else seems to be appreciating how brilliant it is - mostly because it took only two programmes and about twenty minutes to produce!!

 

 

 

Is the 20 minutes including mixing/mastering? It takes me minimum an hour but up to a few hours over days  to lay a guitar track and still not happy. But it's satisfying.

 

 

Edited February 26 by SH73
.

[Hellzero]

15 hours ago, SimonK said:

Let me try posting my AI song here - no one else seems to be appreciating how brilliant it is - mostly because it took only two programmes and about twenty minutes to produce!!

 

 

 

I didn't know that Nickelback was an AI by-product.

 

Now that explains a lot of things. 🤪

[Beedster]

26 minutes ago, SH73 said:

But it's satisfying.

 

 

This ^
 

I play music because of how it makes me feel and no amount of AI will change that. to me and to many people music is what is was way before tech, an emotional, social, and spiritual internal and external communication process. 
 

When we look at music as a product AI will change many things, but so did the advent of audio recording, the advent of electric and electronic music, and the advent of digital, all of which were talked of as gamechangers (both positive and negative) at the time. And just as previous generations found, new ways of being creative with the new tech will open up new opportunities for some and close doors for others

[gjones]

20 hours ago, Dan Dare said:

There's nothing we can do about it, so why get upset?

 That's an excellent philosophy.  It could be the title of a self help book.

 

A very short self help book

[Beedster]

14 minutes ago, Beedster said:

This ^
 

I play music because of how it makes me feel and no amount of AI will change that. to me and to many people music is what is was way before tech, an emotional, social, and spiritual internal and external communication process. 
 

When we look at music as a product AI will change many things, but so did the advent of audio recording, the advent of electric and electronic music, and the advent of digital, all of which were talked of as gamechangers (both positive and negative) at the time. And just as previous generations found, new ways of being creative with the new tech will open up new opportunities for some and close doors for others

I should add broadcasting to the list, which performers of the time were also up in arms about, until they realised how rich it was going to make them 🤔

[Beedster]

5 minutes ago, gjones said:

 That's an excellent philosophy.  It could be the title of a self help book.

 

A very short self help book

Very short but actually very effective 👍

[Hellzero]

17 minutes ago, gjones said:

 That's an excellent philosophy.  It could be the title of a self help book.

 

A very short self help book

 

Or this...

 

[SimonK]

3 hours ago, SH73 said:

Is the 20 minutes including mixing/mastering? It takes me minimum an hour but up to a few hours over days  to lay a guitar track and still not happy. But it's satisfying.

 

 

 

I went to one free online programme and asked it to write some lyrics on the subject of death in the style of Def Leppard (I thought this was appropriately rock & roll!), and then fed the lyrics into another free programme to write the music, specifying the instruments and a male vocal.

 

I have to admit I am quite impressed, although my immediate thought would be to re-record this playing all the instrument live (or at least for real!), and possibly tweak the lyrics a bit. The upshot is that it has potentially produced a very playable song, and I could see myself generating tens of songs using this method, then cherry picking the best to re-record and even play live.

[SH73]

23 hours ago, SimonK said:

 

I went to one free online programme and asked it to write some lyrics on the subject of death in the style of Def Leppard (I thought this was appropriately rock & roll!), and then fed the lyrics into another free programme to write the music, specifying the instruments and a male vocal.

 

I have to admit I am quite impressed, although my immediate thought would be to re-record this playing all the instrument live (or at least for real!), and possibly tweak the lyrics a bit. The upshot is that it has potentially produced a very playable song, and I could see myself generating tens of songs using this method, then cherry picking the best to re-record and even play live.

Mind sharing the programme name? Link? 

[SimonK]

3 hours ago, SH73 said:

Mind sharing the programme name? Link? 

 

I honestly just googled "AI song lyrics" and I think it was https://boredhumans.com/lyrics_generator.php that popped up first, and then once I had the lyrics I googled "Free ai song generator" and https://aisonggenerator.io/  seemed to work best. It wouldn't let me download a higher quality version of the song so I then paid a one month subscription just to keep fiddling round with it a bit more.

 

I can't vouch for these being the best/worst or anything in between. They just seemed to work!

[SH73]

51 minutes ago, SimonK said:

 

I honestly just googled "AI song lyrics" and I think it was https://boredhumans.com/lyrics_generator.php that popped up first, and then once I had the lyrics I googled "Free ai song generator" and https://aisonggenerator.io/  seemed to work best. It wouldn't let me download a higher quality version of the song so I then paid a one month subscription just to keep fiddling round with it a bit more.

 

I can't vouch for these being the best/worst or anything in between. They just seemed to work!

Cheers, I have tried one but had to register to generate it.

[MacDaddy]

Is this about the future of music, or big names wanting to be paid, again?

[SimonK]

9 hours ago, MacDaddy said:

Is this about the future of music, or big names wanting to be paid, again?

 

I think, same as with other areas, AI will change the way music is written and maybe even recorded. It's a tool, and for me can help me write lyrics in particular that I have struggled to do in the past. Then the song/music writing part gives some interesting ideas, but in both cases I think I would want to use the AI as a tool to help develop something that I would probably want to record properly in the end - thus said the AI vocals are loads better than any singer I know, so it may be putting AI vocals over a recorded track.

 

Of course the biggest problem with AI is that it makes it much easier for people to create things, meaning more crap to wade through until you find something good!

[SH73]

I've tried the lyrics generator, is better what was available before on the net. Not bad at all, the rhythm and the tune comes with it naturally with a bit of inspiration.