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How is the requirement to use a computer and maybe pay a cloud subscription in the long term more accessible than other kinds of art? Which individuals are gate

How is the requirement to use a computer and maybe pay a cloud subscription in the long term more accessible than other kinds of art? Which individuals are gatekept exactly? Before you bring up disabled people (as often happens when the term accessibility is used), know that many of them are not happy to be used as a shield for this without ever being asked and would rather speak for themselves. I've tried AI image generation myself and was not impressed. It doesn't let me create freely, it limits me and constantly gravitates towards typical patterns seen in training data. As it completely takes over the actual creation process there is no direct control over the small decisions, which wastes time. Edit: another comment about a different meaning of accessibility: the flood of AI content makes real content less accessible.

Clamchop 1y ago
There's a pretty standard argument that creating artworks should or must require the hardship of developing the skill to bring vision into reality, or paying someone who can. That can be debated, but the position is textbook gatekeeping. Other disapproval comes from different emotional places: a retreading of ludditism borne out of job insecurity, criticism of a dystopia where we've automated away the creative experience of being human but kept the grim work, or perceptions of theft or plagiarism. Whether AI has worked well for you isn't just irrelevant, but contrarian in the face of clear and present value to a lot of people. You can be disgusted with it but you can't claim it isn't there.
- alpaca128 1y ago
  Gatekeeping means restricting power or opportunities. Is it gatekeeping when a skill can be learned for free, and on top is also optional? Is it also gatekeeping to forbid students from using ChatGPT for homework because it would force them to go through the hardship of earning an education? I have seen what 99% of people are doing with this "clear and present value". Turns out when you give people a button to print dopamine they probably aren't going to create the next Mona Lisa, they're just going to press the button more. Even with AI, creating compelling art is still a skill that needs to be learned, and it's still hard. And why would they learn a skill when they just decided against learning a skill? Incentives matter, and here the incentives massively favor quantity over quality. > Whether AI has worked well for you isn't just irrelevant My point was that it's creatively restrictive, and that current models tend to actively steer away from creative outputs. But if you want to limit yourself to what corporations training the models and providing the cloud services deem acceptable, go ahead.
  - Clamchop 1y ago
    I stated exactly what the enumeration of arguments that I know of are and which one is gatekeeping. (It's still the first one, devaluing or dismissing work out of hand if AI was involved, regardless of other merit.)
    - hooverd 1y ago
      Good, it's a socially corrosive technology. Much like you might dismiss a quality product made with child labor.
      - Clamchop 1y ago
        Terrible analogy that trivializes child abuse.
  - Aurornis 1y ago
    > Gatekeeping means restricting power or opportunities. Gatekeeping commonly means excluding others from a group, a label, or an identity. That’s what they’re referring to.
rcarr 1y ago
Try and tell me that a single individual would have been able to create this 10 years ago on a normal salary: https://www.youtube.com/@NeuralViz https://www.youtube.com/@NeuralViz It would have cost millions. Now one person can do it with a laptop and a few hundred dollars of credits a month. AI is 100% making filmmaking more accessible to creative people who otherwise would never have access to the kind of funding and networks required to realise their visions.
- alpaca128 1y ago
  Since 10+ years ago various YT channels have been creating interesting content, sometimes on less than a normal salary, filmed with a phone and with one person acting for three characters at once. And imho they (fortunately) won't disappear if what you linked is representative for what AI enables. None of the videos I've clicked on required AI for the content to be good, and some of the randomness has no real reason to be there.
- sensanaty 1y ago
  Most of those "skits" can be done on a cheap camera with a single person being the actor. In fact, many such videos existed already in the past. Also, they're painfully unoriginal. They're just grabbing bits that The Onion or shows like Rick & Morty have been doing and putting a revolting AI twist to it. It screams to me of 0 effort slop made for the sole purpose of generating money from morons with no creativity clicking on it and being bemused for 10 seconds
alickz 1y ago
>How is the requirement to use a computer and maybe pay a cloud subscription in the long term more accessible than other kinds of art? Because many other kinds of art require thousands of hours to learn before getting to the level of current AI The real gate keeper to art isn't the cost of a pencil, it's the opportunity cost of learning how to use it Some people have creative ideas they cannot realise and tools like AI help them do it. The more people that can realise their creative ideas the better it is for everyone.
- emkoemko 1y ago
  so its for lazy people? who don't want to learn a skill? there are many ways to realize your creativity, and now you have to write your "prompt" for your creative result? then why not just write a story? like authors have been doing for ever ?
- jplusequalt 1y ago
  >The more people that can realise their creative ideas the better it is for everyone There is a fundamental misunderstanding of creating going on here. There's a reason why people always talk about the work/journey/process rather than the end goal. That's what makes someone an artist--not the end result.
  - BeFlatXIII 1y ago
    I don't care at all about the philosophy of art. I have creative goals in mind and not enough time to become competent at all the prerequisite skills to master them.
    - jplusequalt 1y ago
      >I have creative goals in mind and not enough time to become competent at all the prerequisite skills to master them You are consuming, not creating.
      - BeFlatXIII 1y ago
dragonwriter 1y ago
> How is the requirement to use a computer and maybe pay a cloud subscription in the long term more accessible than other kinds of art? Accessibility -- and I don't mean this in the sense particular to disability -- is highly personal; its not so much that it is more accessible, as that it is differentlly-accessible. > I've tried AI image generation myself and was not impressed. It doesn't let me create freely, it limits me and constantly gravitates towards typical patterns seen in training data. As it completely takes over the actual creation process there is no direct control over the small decisions, which wastes time. No offense, but you've only tried the most basic form of AI image generation -- probably something like pure text-to-image -- if that's what you are finding. Sure, that's definitiely what the median person doing AI image gen does, dumping a prompt in ChatGPT or Midjourney or whatever. But its not all that AI image generation offers. You can have as much or as little control of the small (and large) decisions as you want when using AI image generation.
Aurornis 1y ago
> How is the requirement to use a computer and maybe pay a cloud subscription in the long term more accessible than other kinds of art? Sometimes I feel like HN comments are working so hard to downplay AI that they’ve lost the plot. It’s more accessible because you can accomplish amazing storytelling with prompts and a nominal amount of credits instead of spending years learning and honing the art. Is it at the same level as a professional? No, but it’s more than good enough for someone who wants to tell a story. Claiming that computer access is too high of a bar is really weird given that computers and phones (which can also operate these sites) are ubiquitous. > Edit: another comment about a different meaning of accessibility: the flood of AI content makes real content less accessible. No it does not. Not any more than another person signing up for YouTube makes any one channel less “accessible”. Everyone can still access the content the same.

Clamchop 1y ago

There's a pretty standard argument that creating artworks should or must require the hardship of developing the skill to bring vision into reality, or paying someone who can. That can be debated, but the position is textbook gatekeeping. Other disapproval comes from different emotional places: a retreading of ludditism borne out of job insecurity, criticism of a dystopia where we've automated away the creative experience of being human but kept the grim work, or perceptions of theft or plagiarism. Whether AI has worked well for you isn't just irrelevant, but contrarian in the face of clear and present value to a lot of people. You can be disgusted with it but you can't claim it isn't there.

alpaca128 1y ago
Gatekeeping means restricting power or opportunities. Is it gatekeeping when a skill can be learned for free, and on top is also optional? Is it also gatekeeping to forbid students from using ChatGPT for homework because it would force them to go through the hardship of earning an education? I have seen what 99% of people are doing with this "clear and present value". Turns out when you give people a button to print dopamine they probably aren't going to create the next Mona Lisa, they're just going to press the button more. Even with AI, creating compelling art is still a skill that needs to be learned, and it's still hard. And why would they learn a skill when they just decided against learning a skill? Incentives matter, and here the incentives massively favor quantity over quality. > Whether AI has worked well for you isn't just irrelevant My point was that it's creatively restrictive, and that current models tend to actively steer away from creative outputs. But if you want to limit yourself to what corporations training the models and providing the cloud services deem acceptable, go ahead.
- Clamchop 1y ago
  I stated exactly what the enumeration of arguments that I know of are and which one is gatekeeping. (It's still the first one, devaluing or dismissing work out of hand if AI was involved, regardless of other merit.)
  - hooverd 1y ago
    Good, it's a socially corrosive technology. Much like you might dismiss a quality product made with child labor.
    - Clamchop 1y ago
      Terrible analogy that trivializes child abuse.
- Aurornis 1y ago
  > Gatekeeping means restricting power or opportunities. Gatekeeping commonly means excluding others from a group, a label, or an identity. That’s what they’re referring to.

rcarr 1y ago

Try and tell me that a single individual would have been able to create this 10 years ago on a normal salary: https://www.youtube.com/@NeuralViz https://www.youtube.com/@NeuralViz It would have cost millions. Now one person can do it with a laptop and a few hundred dollars of credits a month. AI is 100% making filmmaking more accessible to creative people who otherwise would never have access to the kind of funding and networks required to realise their visions.

alpaca128 1y ago
Since 10+ years ago various YT channels have been creating interesting content, sometimes on less than a normal salary, filmed with a phone and with one person acting for three characters at once. And imho they (fortunately) won't disappear if what you linked is representative for what AI enables. None of the videos I've clicked on required AI for the content to be good, and some of the randomness has no real reason to be there.
sensanaty 1y ago
Most of those "skits" can be done on a cheap camera with a single person being the actor. In fact, many such videos existed already in the past. Also, they're painfully unoriginal. They're just grabbing bits that The Onion or shows like Rick & Morty have been doing and putting a revolting AI twist to it. It screams to me of 0 effort slop made for the sole purpose of generating money from morons with no creativity clicking on it and being bemused for 10 seconds

alickz 1y ago

>How is the requirement to use a computer and maybe pay a cloud subscription in the long term more accessible than other kinds of art? Because many other kinds of art require thousands of hours to learn before getting to the level of current AI The real gate keeper to art isn't the cost of a pencil, it's the opportunity cost of learning how to use it Some people have creative ideas they cannot realise and tools like AI help them do it. The more people that can realise their creative ideas the better it is for everyone.

emkoemko 1y ago
so its for lazy people? who don't want to learn a skill? there are many ways to realize your creativity, and now you have to write your "prompt" for your creative result? then why not just write a story? like authors have been doing for ever ?
jplusequalt 1y ago
>The more people that can realise their creative ideas the better it is for everyone There is a fundamental misunderstanding of creating going on here. There's a reason why people always talk about the work/journey/process rather than the end goal. That's what makes someone an artist--not the end result.
- BeFlatXIII 1y ago
  I don't care at all about the philosophy of art. I have creative goals in mind and not enough time to become competent at all the prerequisite skills to master them.
  - jplusequalt 1y ago
    >I have creative goals in mind and not enough time to become competent at all the prerequisite skills to master them You are consuming, not creating.
    - BeFlatXIII 1y ago

dragonwriter 1y ago

> How is the requirement to use a computer and maybe pay a cloud subscription in the long term more accessible than other kinds of art? Accessibility -- and I don't mean this in the sense particular to disability -- is highly personal; its not so much that it is more accessible, as that it is differentlly-accessible. > I've tried AI image generation myself and was not impressed. It doesn't let me create freely, it limits me and constantly gravitates towards typical patterns seen in training data. As it completely takes over the actual creation process there is no direct control over the small decisions, which wastes time. No offense, but you've only tried the most basic form of AI image generation -- probably something like pure text-to-image -- if that's what you are finding. Sure, that's definitiely what the median person doing AI image gen does, dumping a prompt in ChatGPT or Midjourney or whatever. But its not all that AI image generation offers. You can have as much or as little control of the small (and large) decisions as you want when using AI image generation.

Aurornis 1y ago

> How is the requirement to use a computer and maybe pay a cloud subscription in the long term more accessible than other kinds of art? Sometimes I feel like HN comments are working so hard to downplay AI that they’ve lost the plot. It’s more accessible because you can accomplish amazing storytelling with prompts and a nominal amount of credits instead of spending years learning and honing the art. Is it at the same level as a professional? No, but it’s more than good enough for someone who wants to tell a story. Claiming that computer access is too high of a bar is really weird given that computers and phones (which can also operate these sites) are ubiquitous. > Edit: another comment about a different meaning of accessibility: the flood of AI content makes real content less accessible. No it does not. Not any more than another person signing up for YouTube makes any one channel less “accessible”. Everyone can still access the content the same.