If A.I. took the place of musicians, would you listen to it?


A few questions which I'm curious about. If you have a take on this, please share!

Here's the question:

A.I. is increasingly playing a role in music creation. Not just assisting composers, but generating music.

If you found an A.I. generated song to be enjoyable, interesting, etc. would you have any objection to supporting it by listening and paying for the service which provides it?

If more and more music was like this, and there were fewer and fewer jobs for musicians, would that bother you? -- I'm thinking here about the aesthetics of the issue, not the economics or justice of it. 

I'm trying to understand if people just want to have a certain set of sensations from music and they don't care if there are human beings creating it -- or if it's important for you to know that what you're experiencing from music (or art) is coming from human beings.

Thank you for thinking about this.

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Great topic, it definitely needs some thought, something that I refrain from doing whenever possible. To say what is real or not real is the question? Over the years music has changed constantly thanks to different materials, different production processes, different techniques and of course different ways of thinking. Music will always push the true artists to push the limits or their artform. Do new instruments compare to Stradivarius instruments? Many will say no, does that make the new instruments artificial copies? Electric guitars are available that can be made to sound like Les Paul's, Stratocasters, Telecasters, Flying V's and many more, does that make them artificial? Perhaps these instruments are just the next evolution in music? Regardless of my opinion about rap, grunge or metal the artists still have a following that generates fans and sales, so someone is enjoying their efforts. Why shound AI be any differant, there have been many "artists" over the years that have been "one hit wonders", were they not able to "make it" or were they really not truely interested in their artform? Is a cover band artificial? The long and short of it is if I like the music I'll listen to it, if i don't like it i won't listen to it and I certainly won't purchase the track. 

Electric guitars are available that can be made to sound like Les Paul's, Stratocasters, Telecasters, Flying V's and many more, does that make them artificial?

No. A human has to pick them up and pluck the strings. 

To answer the original question. Not knowingly, with the only possible exception being electronic dance music...every once in awhile I try and re-live my 90's rave days and there is no question in my mind AI could come up with catchy grooves that change seamlessly every 7 minutes, forever.

every once in awhile I try and re-live my 90's rave days

I missed out on all of that.  Was that where everybody got loaded up on MDMA and danced and partied all night?  Sounds like fun.

"Open the pod bay doors Hal" "Hal?" "Open the pod bay doors" - from 2001 - A Space Odyssey.