Diskültr

Content ≠ Art

AI’s been in the news a lot for the past few months, and rightfully so! Its ability to create engages text passages, fantastical images, and decent code is pretty spectacular. Just as an example, I realized early on that developing an AI stack would let you easily create pretty goofy video narratives, so via Shinka Labs I created a Youtube channel called AI Fairy Tales which features videos that utilize AI text generation, image generation, translation, voiceovers, and video editing suites to create bizarre stories.

Pretty cool stuff, and once you find the right combination of tools and tone for whatever you’re trying to do, its easy to crank out a steady flow of legitimately engaging content.

But this is where things get complicated.

The anti-AI contingent of this multifaceted argument says AI’s not art, that it instead hurts real artists, and that at its core its a machine built to plagiarize. Pretty damning.

Then there’s the pro-AI side, which argues that this is the future, and that if you don’t engage with it you’re gonna be left in the dust, regardless of ethics.

I’m not a big fan of either of these factions. See, I’ve supported independent artists in various capacities for close to 15 years now, and I’m not about to stop that anytime soon, so I get the protect the artists thread. Don’t steal stuff, you know? And that’s an issue that really needs addressed within the artificial intelligence scene, as well as crypto, and any other facet of technology.

So the anti-AI argument resonates with me, to an extent. But the funny thing about that argument is that technology - much like art - tends to reflect if not replicate the state of the environment it exists in. So while I do recognize the tendency for various AI platforms to rip off artists and support efforts to rectify that, I also recognize that our current state of being is one in which these sort of activities are permissible until caught. Its not that the technology is malevolent; its that its operating under parameters defined by operator existing within a somewhat kleptocratic reality.

But that’s kind of the business side of things. More, or least as, important, is the actual artistic merit that something holds. Now, I’m not one to strictly define or govern what is, or is not, Art with a capital A, but I do know what guides me in considering something as mere fodder for consumption - what I deem content - or worthy of my full attention and deeper exploration.

There’s history present in Art, a story, usually a rather personal one, and also usually one that you don’t know the half of. There’s been some kind of adventure had by the creator, something that put them through the wringer, be that a painful or pleasant experience. There’s no reason to Art, in my mind anyway, it simply exists at a certain space in someone’s mind, and is eventually brought into being through trial and error. From there, its up to the observer to figure out what’s up for themselves.

The more an artist exercises their skill, the more they’re capable of performing, and that’s where things get interesting. The higher the competence, the higher the notoriety, from which monetization becomes a serious part of the conversation. If an artist then decides to pursue that financial element via methods proven to be gainful in that respect, they’ve found their niche. Or, in other words, they’ve jumped the shark into the world of content.

That’s not necessarily a bad thing - it is, after all, a way to make a living via your hard earned talents ostensibly performing a valuable but perhaps not novel task - but I do hold that as sort of my gold standard for content as opposed to art.

Which is why AI is now kind of cool, because it potentially allows anyone to make decent content, which then can potentially fund their more artistic and exploratory endeavors. Satan knows Japan could use more of this, buuuuut…..

Japan Inc. Doesn’t Like AI At All