Given how easily algorithmically-generated music could have fit that role before now, I’d would have thought that was a goner long ago. It’s some very low-hanging fruit. The synthesis of sound effects is going to be weird, once it starts appearing “in the wild.” Foley already uses sounds that aren’t the thing, but “sound right.” This is going to create whole new notions of what things are supposed to sound like, because of repeated exposure to generated sound effects that sound nothing like what they’re supposed to be.
That’s actually interesting, how it’s (accidentally) creating new instruments, in this case merging the human whistle, synths and wind instruments, maybe? I suppose that is the nature of neural-network generated images and sounds - it generates things that straddle multiple categories because the system can’t distinguish between them. You end up with hybrid sounds/images that aren’t anything in particular, even if they evoke (or morph into) multiple things.
That’s both the only interesting thing about the AI-generated stuff, but also the thing that’s ubiquitous, instantly recognizable about it and thus over-exposed about AI stuff. It’d be interesting, potentially, to use neural networks to create novel “instruments” that humans make use of, for example, but the whole aesthetic of it is going to get old, fast.
Also, if you get rid of the actual paying jobs, what you’re left with is a much smaller group of hobbyists struggling to find the free time to do the art, and not doing enough of it to learn/hone the skills that professionals have. On top of which, if there’s no possible career there, you lose much/all of the educational infrastructure in the field. I.e. it all gets worse, not better.
It’s ironic (not really) that the reality is that creative labor is getting automated, but the things AI can’t do are the jobs no one actually wants, like make clothes in sweatshops or clean toilets. (No point in even trying to automate those, if you’re not paying the workers anything to begin with, after all…) All those sci-fi stories about people living lives of leisure to do art ran into the realities of capitalism, trying to create a world where labor exists to drive around, clean the toilets of, and make the clothes of the owners of capital.
That’s a reasonable worry - if there’s no career in it, then few want to get an education in it, and the pressure is to remove the relevant classes from educational institutions entirely. Serious publications and discourse about it disappear. You’re left with hobbyists (and hobbyist discussions), but even fewer than you have now, because it’s been de-valued.
