If AI replaces musicians, does the entire plugin industry die with them?

[ghettosynth]

Most of you seem to completely ignore one of the biggest downsides of ai. Since you don't need any skills to produce and upload music/noise today, there will be and already are more new uploads every day, more new music in one day than you could listen to within 10 years. A day has 24 hours.

We seem to give music a value, don't we?
Otherwise kvr wouldn't be full of posts.
And I am not even talking about quality, every full ai production I listened to sounded like crap like something I heard a thousand times before.

What's the value of music today and tomorrow?
It has the value of a fart, doesn't it?
Everyone can produce music, everyone can produce farts. There is lots of farting every day, there is a lot (way too many) of new music/noise everyday. Farts do not smell well, most of today's music, as well.

Some say that some might use ai in a creative way, who cares?, cuz ai will cause a complete overdose of available crap. There will be so many farts every day, that you could hardly breathe.

Nobody is ignoring it. You just aren't recognizing that it doesn't really matter. Production and distribution were democratized long ago. Only time remains as scarce. You can't really say talent is scarce. Anyone with an afternoon can produce ambient wankery. So, many people upload "cats cats cats..."or their version of it. What it means is that the thoughtful modular musings of others won't be heard. You can both upload, until it costs too much to store your stuff, which may never happen. If it does, the the price is raised, problem solved.

Here's the thing though "cats cats cats..." has 7k+ streams on Spotify, which, says something about its value, even though that may not be comforting.

People will keep making music, and you'll opt in to be trained from, or pay for the privilege not to in the same way that you have to now pay extra to not see ads with your movies included with prime.

Now, let's suppose that I'm completely wrong, and you're completely right. What should "we" do, because let's suppose that you were really convincing and everyone on KVR just stopped using AI at all. What would that change? I think that you know the answer.

[DCrown]

No, ai is not to blame for too many produced crap, too many uploads.AI will just make it worse for the older generations (age 35+ now), young generation will accept it, cuz that's all they will know in future, ai will be their roots.
Well, the old generation still can listen to compositions that were made between 1650 and 1995 (everthing before pro tools&co.).so not really a problem.
Pro Tools and the internet are/were the cause of drastic changes.
Frankly speaking music has lost its value also for me today, cuz you can't hide from the vibe of an era and "zeitgeist". I don't see most young people giving music a lot of value any more.
It will be what it will be and I probably won't be in 67 years any more, in 67 years it's 2093. Maybe a song in 2093 will only have 5 seconds, who knows and cares...

[bermudagold]

AI collapses the friction between idea and artifact, and that's the value, independent of the quality of the artifact.

The music software industry has spent almost 20 years in race-to-the-bottom pricing enabled by mass marketing to non-professionals. I bet it turns out a lot of those people and kids who would have been them would rather just use suno. RIP.

probably correct...i've learned that a lot of people I thought knew this didn't realize that this market did a big u turn because of the pandemic...a lot of these companies had their best years in company existence during the pandemic...which changed the focus of developers because these new pandemic entrants had a different focus...most were collecting plugins like baseball cards and playing with dsp like a videogame...and while plugin collecting and dsp video gaming are perfectly fine hobbies...they are much different hobbies than being a composer and musician...most of these folks weren't publishing finished songs or performing gigs anyway...plugins in DAWs had just become guitar hero in the PlayStation for a new generation...so they are probably much more likely to abandon the DAW and plugin paradigm for the cradle to grave AI tool paradigm

I think the point that is glossed over is that most of the differing viewpoints are implicitly and/or subconsciously driven by dreams of fame and money from music whether they admit it or or not...where you perceive yourself in the timeline and food chain of achieving that dream shapes your worldview...the casuals who entered during the pandemic know they are behind the curve, so they are all for the AI tools as they believe it will allow them to catch up or cut the line...the people who have been at it since the early days of computer music technology feel like they have been putting in the work slowly cutting the hill; and right when technology is coalescing to the point where all the tools they always dreamed of are finally coming to fruition putting peak power in the hands of the independent musician,...AI comes in and makes it and all their gains null and void by leapfrogging them and raising an already untenable noise floor to astronomical heights...further putting the possibility of fame and fortune out of reach...so they hate everything AI

But that view is disingenuous as well...because a lot of those same people love all the AI "lite" tools that existed prior...midi packs, loops, construction kits, chord generators, generative midi...look at the number of those products in the market and on kvr database...look how many threads they generate...look how many pages they run for...and people are drawn to those tools for largely the same reasons others are drawn to AI...cause if they really had the work ethic, discipline, and talent to be the doing it for the love of the art purists they claim; their interest in these AI "lite" tools wouldn't be this high...the excuse is always "I just like to have them for writers block"...IME that is largely a cop out...writers block has become mythological in its prevalence...most composers and musicians I know almost never have writers block...people I know who really love music almost always have something personal to say musically and almost find it difficult NOT to express themselves and what they are currently going through musically...chances are if you have "writers block" a lot...u may have the wrong hobby

so how you view AI is directly related to how close you believe you were to "making it"...while the reality is that opportunities in music as an industry have been steadily declining for decades...the mp3 was a direct hit, p2p file sharing was the mortal wound, iTunes with songs for 99 cents killing the album and prioritizing virality the first nail in the coffin, streaming the final nail in the coffin, and AI is shoveling the dirt on top...the same technology advances that democratized the industry attempting to level the playing field by lowering the entry point,...has also raised the noise floor...you went from the old parasitical system of gatekeepers that was far from ideal, crooked, and killed diversity...to a new set of parasitical gatekeepers who are far from ideal, crooked, and kill diversity...

the problem with technology is its not a panacea...sometimes its a zero sum game...most times for every problem it solves, it creates 2 new problems you didn't have before...but in the west especially, we don't approach technology carefully with pragmatism and discernment...we rush headlong with reckless abandon under the guise of a technology arms race...social media was the latest example...all the engineers, scientists, and intellects knew from analysis that social media held more potential cons than pros, but they sat on their hands...now everyone wants to ban or regulate social media after all the damage to civilization is done...it looks like with AI there are no lessons learned

[mixyguy2]

They thought computers would do away with all manual labor. It still hasn't happened.

Stop posting silly absolutes. Nobody thought it would do away with ALL manual labor. But it has in fact done away with some of it.

They thought Synthesizers were going to get rid of people playing "real" instruments. Hasn't happened.

Who's "they?" I never heard or read anyone claiming that.

They thought home studios were going to do away with professional recording studios. Still hasn't happened.

And again.

So stop with the gloom and doom. Real music isn't going away. I will bet every dollar I have in the bank on that.

I didn't say or imply it was "going away." Nor has anyone else that I've seen.

You said "AI will not take over the music industry." That could happen and "real" music could still exist...just much less of it. That isn't "gloom and doom." That's a very real threat. If you want to bury your head in the sand and pretend otherwise, whatever, have fun.

[Grizzellda]

Artificial Intelligence Is a modern, sophisticated tool.

I feel we can use it , and it could be really cool, and helpfull.

I do not feel it will ever become a "person " or any thing like that...personality is issued by the Creator, as far as I understand.

[Igro]

When I turn the radio on, I hear the music that is way worse than AI music. WAAAYY worse.

[teilo]

Is AI a threat to traditional music production? Yes, if most of what you do is commissioned work, all you produce is derivative, and you don't particularly care exactly how it sounds as long as it sounds really good and is a catchy and memorable tune. No one is going to pay you for incidental music anymore if they can run a dozen prompts and get something that sounds good. I sure wouldn't.

Can you use incorporate AI into your music productions and still compose and maintain control over exactly what you want? Also yes. If you haven't tried something like Suno Studio, where you can upload your own instrumentals, write your own lyrics, and have it generate backing tracks and stems, you have no idea of the power that is there.

As jamcat noted, a lot of people have no idea how AI actually creates music. Those who think it is straight up ripping off other artists are dead wrong. It's not.

AI will be a tool of music producers on a spectrum from fully produced tracks down to single instrumentals or vocals incorporated into tracks produced the traditional way.

Generating tracks entirely from a prompt, lyrics and all, is something anyone can do, and that accounts for 99% of the AI slop currently flooding Spotify. And by "slop" I don't mean it doesn't sound good. That's the kicker. It usually DOES sound good. It's slop because it's low effort. But even the low effort tracks sound better than the bulk of what is on the radio today.

But once you want to step out side of traditional song structures, AI still can't compare to humans. Try to generate, for example, a really good prog metal track. It's not bad. It's just blah. It doesn't have that spark, those killer modulations in just the right place, and that non-linear structure that good prog has.

But despite this, I have done a lot of experimentation with Suno Studio using it in more creative ways. Feeding it my own lyrics, my own partially produced tracks, etc. If you place these tools into the hands of a good producer / composer / lyricist, mix and master them, the result can be extraordinary.

AI music isn't going away. It's only getting better. And it will absolutely change how music is produced.

[Parco Molo]

The new hobby of the masses, or the new national sport, is predicting the future.

It would be good to be a little humble; none of us has a crystal ball. Of course, logic can be used to make assumptions about the future, and the question “Cui Bono” can often be helpful.
But why didn't millions of people buy Bitcoin when it cost cents? Why didn't millions of people foresee the crash of 2008?

No one knows the future! We can all have an opinion, but that's all it is, friends.

My humble opinion on AI:

Virtually everything will lose value

[DCrown]

Is AI a threat to traditional music production? Yes, if most of what you do is commissioned work, all you produce is derivative, and you don't particularly care exactly how it sounds as long as it sounds really good and is a catchy and memorable tune. No one is going to pay you for incidental music anymore if they can run a dozen prompts and get something that sounds good. I sure wouldn't.

Can you use incorporate AI into your music productions and still compose and maintain control over exactly what you want? Also yes. If you haven't tried something like Suno Studio, where you can upload your own instrumentals, write your own lyrics, and have it generate backing tracks and stems, you have no idea of the power that is there.

As jamcat noted, a lot of people have no idea how AI actually creates music. Those who think it is straight up ripping off other artists are dead wrong. It's not.

AI will be a tool of music producers on a spectrum from fully produced tracks down to single instrumentals or vocals incorporated into tracks produced the traditional way.

Generating tracks entirely from a prompt, lyrics and all, is something anyone can do, and that accounts for 99% of the AI slop currently flooding Spotify. And by "slop" I don't mean it doesn't sound good. That's the kicker. It usually DOES sound good. It's slop because it's low effort. But even the low effort tracks sound better than the bulk of what is on the radio today.

But once you want to step out side of traditional song structures, AI still can't compare to humans. Try to generate, for example, a really good prog metal track. It's not bad. It's just blah. It doesn't have that spark, those killer modulations in just the right place, and that non-linear structure that good prog has.

But despite this, I have done a lot of experimentation with Suno Studio using it in more creative ways. Feeding it my own lyrics, my own partially produced tracks, etc. If you place these tools into the hands of a good producer / composer / lyricist, mix and master them, the result can be extraordinary.

AI music isn't going away. It's only getting better. And it will absolutely change how music is produced.

It sounds good? Music is not about good sound primarily, it is about good, creative songs.
But I see, even Rick Beato tries saying something good about the uncreative bad songs on Spotify, so he says the sound is good lol
Overpolished, Overcompressed, limited to -4 LUFS + Autotune, wow, what a good sound haha

When uploads on Spotify will reach the 1 Mio. mark on one day (and it won't take long any more), I will take one day off to listen to all the uploaded songs

[dune_rave]

If AI replaces musicians, musicians will replace AI !

[IvyBirds]

Most of you seem to completely ignore one of the biggest downsides of ai. Since you don't need any skills to produce and upload music/noise today, there will be and already are more new uploads every day, more new music in one day than you could listen to within 10 years. A day has 24 hours.

No one is ignoring anything when it comes to AI as what you speak about is not an AI problem

That issue already existed decades ago. So it's incorrect to blame AI

When iTunes came in April of 2003 it had a catalog of over 200,000 songs. That number grew to over a million by August of 2004, in 2022 Apple music crossed the 100 Million Song threshold

In just 19 years Apple grew it's catalog from 200,000 to 100 Million songs all without any AI

During that time streaming services came out where you had millions then tens of millions and now hundreds of millions of songs available to listen to in unlimited fashion anywhere you want for a few bucks a month, all without any involvement from AI

During that time if you sailed the high seas you had millions of songs available (illegally), all for free.

All of that happened long before any AI tools were available in the real world

AI is just the latest scapegoat as to why people don't get success in the music business. They want to pretend it's all about the art, it's not because if it were they wouldn't care what other people are doing or using or how many songs are on Spotify

AI is ZERO threat to anyone's musical artistic endeavors, because you can make any music you want, however you want as an artist.

Anyone claiming to be an artist can just ignore AI and make the art they want and AI will have zero effect on them. It's like it doesn't exist. You make art for yourself, for an audience of the person who looks back at you in the mirror. If other people like it that's a bonus but that most certainly isn't required

The problem is most people don't make art they make commercial products and pretend it's art.

Then they want to blame everything and everyone when they are unable to sell their commercial products, and mock those who are successful at doing the thing they can't

They want fame and fortune and if they don't get it, it's never their fault, someone or something is always to blame. In early 2026 AI has become the scapegoat as to why they still have to have a day job and don't have the success they feel entitled to

[rod_zero]

[BBFG#]

I'm starting to envision AI Automata filling the internet and not allowing human involvement without passing their own version of a Turing test. Forcing all musicians to return to hardware like the primitives AI already knows we are.

Corporations already function as gatekeepers here. You can't post here if you don't pass the basic compliance test. You're trusted to post up to the point that you fail the test. Humans, not AI, invented that structure.

Compliance and sentience are two different things.

What I'm posing as an additional question is "What happens when AI reproduces itself to the point of flooding and saturating the Internet and automatically parsing out any human attempt to participate in it?"

[DCrown]

I wrote ai is not to blame, it just makes it even worse - 10 Mio + uploads every day in future. The good thing, there will still be about 0,01% of good music and that's a lot

[ghettosynth]

I'm starting to envision AI Automata filling the internet and not allowing human involvement without passing their own version of a Turing test. Forcing all musicians to return to hardware like the primitives AI already knows we are.

Corporations already function as gatekeepers here. You can't post here if you don't pass the basic compliance test. You're trusted to post up to the point that you fail the test. Humans, not AI, invented that structure.

Compliance and sentience are two different things.

What I'm posing as an additional question is "What happens when AI reproduces itself to the point of flooding and saturating the Internet and automatically parsing out any human attempt to participate in it?"

You've been reading too much sci-fi. I get that people want to think about this as something real, but I'm just not here for that.