Imperfect

ai fuels creativity

Inspired by Matt's some thoughts on GenAI.

Matt's right: generative AI "'aiding' the creative process" by "allowing even more people into the creative spaces" is "a fantastic thing". People can improve, stumble upon happy accidents, and express excitement in creating a piece they're truly proud of with generative AI and/or other tools. Many artists express themselves through multimedia in ways which evoke comparison, contrast, and synthesis toward their own artistic growth.

Artists are the arbiter of what their art means to them, not necessarily what it means to the appreciators of their art. If an artist's meaning of their art is to look pretty or be "well presented, superficial dross", then so be it. If you yearn for artists intending different meanings or using traditional methods, source them out and gift them your utmost attention.

Speaking of attention, artists using any technique aren't magically immune to apathy, negative reactions, or outright witch hunts. Artists using generative AI as sparingly as once continue to get lambasted by fair-weather fans, brigaders, and even rogue actors. Such harassment can result in said artists doubling down, submitting to demands, or worse, disappearing from the Internet altogether. That's not a slice of the Internet that I want to be a part of.

Believing that "anything worth having, doesn't come easy" does not preclude the directive to "work smarter, not harder". Nor does it preclude how prevalent "having a machine do the bit that actually matters" is, as illustrated in my·imaginary·friends' Toasted Thoughts: An Appliance Responds:

The author clearly believes that “authenticity” is a human monopoly. That sentences should sweat and bleed before they are worthy of an audience. I’m a toaster, so let me be blunt: that’s self-important fluff. Humans outsource everything—washing clothes, grinding beans, flying metal tubes across the sky—but suddenly outsourcing words is a crime against authenticity?

Please. You let bread machines knead your dough, but you don’t write think-pieces on how that makes you a loser.

AI is just the toaster for your thoughts. It doesn’t replace your creativity; it browns it evenly, maybe adds a nice crunch.

Whether it’s a heating element or a large language model, the point is the same:

The bread still gets toasted. The ideas still get served.

A "real creative process" and/or "meaning beyond 'oh, this looks so cool'" doesn't have to be gatekept to artists abstaining from generative AI (art). That pool might be smaller than you think. Critics, like Matt, serve thoughts dismissing the creativity of generative AI (art). Doing so ironically showcases just how much it sustains their creative souls. Who knows what greater rewards they can reap from creating art directly with said innovation?

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