AI has replaced work for 20% of full-time employees in the U.S., survey says

ThatRobGuy said:

That's art as we see the market for it now.

However, I'm referring to it being the sort resembling the "retro/vintage" appeal of human generated art.

Sort of like how despite there being handheld music devices in our pockets that can store millions of songs, with near perfect quality, there's still been an uptick in people wanting vinyl records for the "retro" appeal and the collectibility.

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The "uptick" is only the very tiniest fraction of what the vinyl market had been.

But keep in mind that interest in creating art for art's own sake exists in a vanishingly small percentage of people.

RDKirk said:

In many cases, we've already been adapted to it. Popular music, for instance, could have been AI a couple of decades ago. We won't notice the difference when it goes completely AI. There are already some fully AI groups that have been very popular.

In my portrait photography, I've pulled backward. I had moved away from locations and intricately designed set pieces to digitized background for a bit prior to the Covid lockdown, but in the last couple of years I've gone back to the old ways. My intention now is to provide clients with having had a "genuine moment" that the image in the picture was "real," even if it was hand-made.

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ThatRobGuy said:

That's art as we see the market for it now.

However, I'm referring to it being the sort resembling the "retro/vintage" appeal of human generated art.

Sort of like how despite there being handheld music devices in our pockets that can store millions of songs, with near perfect quality, there's still been an uptick in people wanting vinyl records for the "retro" appeal and the collectibility.

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There will probably be a retro/human niche, sure. But that won't be the mass market. The contemporary country fans packing out stadiums aren't exactly a bunch of cork sniffers looking for the latest aleatoric piece funded by an NEA grant. They want hick hop mad libs with autotune artifacts as thick as the coal they're rolling.

ThatRobGuy said:

That's a lot of random words lol

All joking aside, people tend to find purpose within the frameworks they're given, so I do feel that there will be an uptick in both independent artists, and demand for their product in the coming years.

If AI happens to automate me out of a job before 2035 when I plan on hanging up my hat and retiring, my plan is to fallback on photography.

You'd be surprised at the number of well-to-do types who will spend money on things that we may see as mundane simply out of a lack of anything else to do.


Fun fact, would you believe that a high-quality print of this image (that I took on a random winter day in Ohio up by lake Erie) fetched $400 at a local art festival (one of my co-workers asked me for some of the raw files I had, and I told them I'd split the haul if they could manage to sell them lol)




And this one sold a few copies too evidently

**Edit** - pics redacted/removed, just realized a reverse image search could technically give away too much information if someone knew the right tools to use lol



...so there's still a market out there for certain art forms.


And I think areas like comedy (provided AI doesn't rip of whatever guardrails it has) will always have a market as well.

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If you didn't see an "uptick" in independent artists before, you won't see an "uptick" in the future. There won't be the heyday of the 70s neighborhood garage bands making it big--or at least making a living.

I predicted an "uptick in independent musical artists" back in the mid 80s when CD burners dropped below $500, making regional production and distribution practical.

It didn't happen.

I again predicted an "uptick in independent musical artists" back in the mid 90s when Internet distribution made individual production and distribution practical.

It didn't happen the, either.

An "uptick" didn't even happen when Spotify was there to give independents a bit of distribution.

Basically, the mass market will accept what the mass distributors give it.

There will still be, as @iluvatar5150 said, a niche. But a niche is not an "uptick." It's a reduction. There will be a few amateur dabblers and a very, very few with wealthy patronage.

ThatRobGuy said:

I often find myself agreeing with Yang on some things here and there, and this would be one of those cases.

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Yang is no different than the rest. He spoke about Ai replacing people years ago in a clip I've posted in the past. He was referencing his friends in silicon valley much like he did today. Rest assured he's profiting too.

ThatRobGuy said:

60% tax on automation that goes into some sort of UBI fund, or perhaps even directly to the person that was replaced.

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Why would corporations do that? Did they volunteer to absorb the tariffs for consumers and offer refunds when it was declared unconstitutional? Of course not. They've maintained practices that benefit them at the expense of others.

*Laid off workers and replaced them with Ai or reassigned positions for Ai instead and reduced hiring.

*Openly admitted their intention to replace a portion of the workforce with no suggestions for training or comparable roles for workers.

*Proposed metering Ai instead of providing unlimited access (Sam Altman). Customers would pay according to use instead of a flat rate.

*Developed contracts with home builders that would attach devices to the outer wall that serve the data center and can't be removed.

*Suggested the discontinuance of personal computers in deference to cloud suscriptions.

That's what's coming out of silicon valley and profit is the focus not our betterment. If Altman gets his way Ai use will decrease which puts less pressure on data centers, limits access to information and increases their revenue without the tax proposal. They'd offer a monthly credit and write it off.

ThatRobGuy said:

Perhaps this next part sounds a little dystopian...but my prediction is
Ultimately, AI will supplant all of the "work stuff" that people don't like to do anyway, and we'll shift towards an "interests-based" economy where commodities will be "human generated material" catering to niche markets. So the various arts will actually get an uptick in demand in the future.

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That's what many hope and are led to believe. But talk to someone using Ai in a role they could put a human in and you may hear a different story. Much like we saw when companies began looking overseas for workers and leveraged the exchange rate to get cheaper employees. Virtual positions had a major affect and some never returned.

~bella

ThatRobGuy said:

That's a lot of random words lol

All joking aside, people tend to find purpose within the frameworks they're given, so I do feel that there will be an uptick in both independent artists, and demand for their product in the coming years.

If AI happens to automate me out of a job before 2035 when I plan on hanging up my hat and retiring, my plan is to fallback on photography.

You'd be surprised at the number of well-to-do types who will spend money on things that we may see as mundane simply out of a lack of anything else to do.


Fun fact, would you believe that a high-quality print of this image (that I took on a random winter day in Ohio up by lake Erie) fetched $400 at a local art festival (one of my co-workers asked me for some of the raw files I had, and I told them I'd split the haul if they could manage to sell them lol)




And this one sold a few copies too evidently

**Edit** - pics redacted/removed, just realized a reverse image search could technically give away too much information if someone knew the right tools to use lol



...so there's still a market out there for certain art forms.


And I think areas like comedy (provided AI doesn't rip of whatever guardrails it has) will always have a market as well.

Click to expand...

As someone who makes their living making commercial “art”, and who also has a side gig as an ankle biter in a separate industry… Making a couple bucks here and there by nibbling at the margins is fairly easy. Scaling that up into a decent-paying full-time gig (or a business with employees) is much, much harder.

Your pic sold for $400. After expenses, you probably cleared $100-200. That’s nice, but in order to go full time, you’d need to be selling five of those a day, every day. Is there that much of a market for photos of Lake Erie?

I saw a video earlier this year along these lines. Ai was pinpointed as the catalyst for reset but there's a twist. Wherever you are financially at the time of the shift is where you'll remain. Ai is the barrier and upward mobility is no longer possible. There's a historical precedent for the same and I believed it. What silicon valley termed 'the underclass' Yuval Noah Harari defined as "useless people."

Silicon Valley's Strange New Obsession

Silicon Valley is no stranger to a lot of goofy insider terminology for what are really, some pretty basic concepts. But there is one new buzzy phrase that is generally being taken a lot more seriously, and is also a lot less funny.

“Escaping the permanent underclass” has become a warning that your value as a human being is on a strict depreciation schedule, and that these next few years may be the last opportunity we have left before society is forever split between the people who own enough assets to support themselves independently in a fully automated utopia.

Everybody else who has no further value (at least so far as the market is concerned) because their labor has been entirely undercut by machines… It’s pretty grim stuff, (and putting aside the small little technicality that this is the future they are working hard to create), this idea is being taken seriously enough that it’s worth understanding.


~bella

bèlla said:

I saw a video earlier this year along these lines. Ai was pinpointed as the catalyst for reset but there's a twist. Wherever you are financially at the time of the shift is where you'll remain. Ai is the barrier and upward mobility is no longer possible. There's a historical precedent for the same and I believed it. What silicon valley termed 'the underclass' Yuval Noah Harari defined as "useless people."

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yes this is basically continuous.

my grandpa started out as a blacksmith shoeing horses, ended up drilling oil wells later in life, then growing raisin grapes. He lived long enough to see mechanical harvesters replace mexican labor.

johansen said:

yes this is basically continuous.

my grandpa started out as a blacksmith shoeing horses, ended up drilling oil wells later in life, then growing raisin grapes. He lived long enough to see mechanical harvesters replace mexican labor.

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I remember an article about that from The Wall Street Journal. It was introducing mechanical harvesters and noted the cost savings and their ability to work continually. If memory serves it was the nineties and I saved the article and knew it was significant and here we are.

The workforce has undergone many changes. Once upon a time people worked for one company and retired until they didn't. Unions and pensions were the norm until they weren't. The cost of living was comparable the wages now it isn't. Entry-level positions were plentiful now they're outsourced overseas or to Ai. If you look at our history things are getting worse not better for the majority.

~bella