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

[D-Fusion]

Saturation of the market is a bigger threat than AI is in the Software domain.
The last year had a lot of rock bottom sales to compete against each other so i think we will see many companies go down soon.
AI Is a bigger threat to the Hardware market in todays Economy where AI is buying up and driving up prices for Ram and storage and other Electronic parts and as soon as they have bought it all up there will be nothing left to build a Hardware synth, Groovebox or Workstation and they will have to go back to the 70s with Synths without presets to survive.

[teilo]

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

Yes, it sounds good. Good enough that it is can completely replace the need for anyone to commission incidental music for various creative productions such as podcasts. Good enough that it can create catchy songs people can remember and like. Good enough that people listen to AI-created tracks and like them.

Your "it is about good, creative songs" is irrelevant to anything I said. Because all of your criticisms are also true of a huge number of human-produced tracks. Stop thinking like a music enthusiast or producer, and start thinking about the typical music consumer.

If you think that AI needs to replicate the creativity of very good lyricists and composers, and the impeccable quality of very well mixed and mastered songs, you are fooling yourself.

And if you think generative AI has no place in the workflow of legitimate musicians, you are repeating the same mistake we have seen since the music industry has existed, whenever some new technology comes on the scene.

[Seafire Mk2]

Is it only intelligent musicians who get replaced?

[DCrown]

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

Yes, it sounds good. Good enough that it is can completely replace the need for anyone to commission incidental music for various creative productions such as podcasts. Good enough that it can create catchy songs people can remember and like. Good enough that people listen to AI-created tracks and like them.

Your "it is about good, creative songs" is irrelevant to anything I said. Because all of your criticisms are also true of a huge number of human-produced tracks. Stop thinking like a music enthusiast or producer, and start thinking about the typical music consumer.

If you think that AI needs to replicate the creativity of very good lyricists and composers, and the impeccable quality of very well mixed and mastered songs, you are fooling yourself.

And if you think generative AI has no place in the workflow of legitimate musicians, you are repeating the same mistake we have seen since the music industry has existed, whenever some new technology comes on the scene.

I never said AI only is to blame for bad quality. The market already is oversaturated and AI will make it worse. Prince predicted it and Chopin predicted it already in 1848.
It started with Pro Tools and internet 30 years ago. Music production and distribution changed drastically. Catchy songs people can remember the last 15 years? You must be joking lol

I ask.again and again, how could you play in the NBA if you couldn't play basketball better than average or even not at all?!


Isn't it interesting I can still remember most Beatles songs, maybe could play most of them immediately on guitar and piano and I never even was a Beatles fan and have not listened to their songs for many years?! Guess why. No, your view is completely different than mine and that's ok.
99,9% of today's music is an insult to speakers and ears made by people who prefer laziness, fake, innovations over hard work, talent, tradition and musicianship. Next generations might drown in laziness and in their comfort zone.

I am a Prince fan, he is my main influence and I dislike AI as much as he would if he was still alive. "Real music by real musicians!"

[twal]

If music is so bad nowadays perhaps AI can help that. If not, then perhaps your wish for it to be unsuccessful will be granted. What's the fuss then? Seems to me the only problem with AI in music is losing the human element, but if the human element sucks so much why does it even matter?

Music will evolve and carry on. If you don't like the AI stuff don't listen. I'm sure people stopped listening to Madonna once the technology got to a certain point people stopped using 80's synths? But, people still use that sound. Beatles will never make a new song. You have to listen to old stuff. Many kids of the 70's won't touch Madonna with a 10 foot pole. You don't have to either.

I don't think the music industry gets warped into some disfigured remnant of human history to the point that people flat out stop listening to music altogether, new or old. I would assume that 1% of people on Kvr listen to modern rap. Probably more but the one's who don't have already thrown in the towel so to speak. There was a time when people rode horses for travel, but now you must use a man-made machine. You can continue to make music on your own however you want. Just some thoughts. Perhaps wrong but that's what I got.

[D-Fusion]

[DCrown]

If music is so bad nowadays perhaps AI can help that. If not, then perhaps your wish for it to be unsuccessful will be granted. What's the fuss then? Seems to me the only problem with AI in music is losing the human element, but if the human element sucks so much why does it even matter?

Music will evolve and carry on. If you don't like the AI stuff don't listen. I'm sure people stopped listening to Madonna once the technology got to a certain point people stopped using 80's synths? But, people still use that sound. Beatles will never make a new song. You have to listen to old stuff. Many kids of the 70's won't touch Madonna with a 10 foot pole. You don't have to either.

I don't think the music industry gets warped into some disfigured remnant of human history to the point that people flat out stop listening to music altogether, new or old. I would assume that 1% of people on Kvr listen to modern rap. Probably more but the one's who don't have already thrown in the towel so to speak. There was a time when people rode horses for travel, but now you must use a man-made machine. You can continue to make music on your own however you want. Just some thoughts. Perhaps wrong but that's what I got.

You could only avoid listening to AI music if AI music was labeled as AI. So AI productions must be separated from real productions. That's a problem. And I don't care if people make some ai noise, but I am not interested in hearing it, every ai track I listened to was not good for me, not good at all and yes lots of ai-free stuff also not good, that's why a qualification system is needed imo.

And I ask.again , how could you play in the NBA if you couldn't play basketball better than average or even not at all?!
Trying to sing although you can't sing, you can use autotune or let some ai voice sing it, let ai mix my song, let ai write some lyrics etc That's all just ridiculous circus with lots of clowns making you cry instead of laugh.

[BBFG#]

An article on "Poisoned AI" I found interesting.
https://www.zdnet.com/article/ai-model- ... ing-signs/

Some of the things I heard before mentioned by others on KVR.
The question arises of how this relates to music and whether your creation is truly yours or just following triggered responses made by those "bad actors" steering through the back door.

[Tiles]

The idea that AI-generated music should be specially labeled or that a qualification system is needed is misguided. Modern music production already relies heavily on tools, automation, and various forms of assistance. AI is simply a continuation of this trend, not a fundamentally separate category.

The comparison to professional sports does not hold. Art is not a closed competition with entry qualifications. There is no objective threshold that determines who is “allowed” to create or release music. The only real filter is whether people listen to it or not.

Disliking AI-generated music is perfectly valid on a personal level, but personal taste cannot be turned into a general rule for what is acceptable in the market.

[wagtunes]

Messed Up Format

[wagtunes]

If music is so bad nowadays perhaps AI can help that. If not, then perhaps your wish for it to be unsuccessful will be granted. What's the fuss then? Seems to me the only problem with AI in music is losing the human element, but if the human element sucks so much why does it even matter?

Music will evolve and carry on. If you don't like the AI stuff don't listen. I'm sure people stopped listening to Madonna once the technology got to a certain point people stopped using 80's synths? But, people still use that sound. Beatles will never make a new song. You have to listen to old stuff. Many kids of the 70's won't touch Madonna with a 10 foot pole. You don't have to either.

I don't think the music industry gets warped into some disfigured remnant of human history to the point that people flat out stop listening to music altogether, new or old. I would assume that 1% of people on Kvr listen to modern rap. Probably more but the one's who don't have already thrown in the towel so to speak. There was a time when people rode horses for travel, but now you must use a man-made machine. You can continue to make music on your own however you want. Just some thoughts. Perhaps wrong but that's what I got.

You could only avoid listening to AI music if AI music was labeled as AI. So AI productions must be separated from real productions. That's a problem. And I don't care if people make some ai noise, but I am not interested in hearing it, every ai track I listened to was not good for me, not good at all and yes lots of ai-free stuff also not good, that's why a qualification system is needed imo.

And I ask.again , how could you play in the NBA if you couldn't play basketball better than average or even not at all?!
Trying to sing although you can't sing, you can use autotune or let some ai voice sing it, let ai mix my song, let ai write some lyrics etc That's all just ridiculous circus with lots of clowns making you cry instead of laugh.

You don't like AI music. I get it. But don't force people to conform to YOUR view of the world. They can put out whatever music they want with whatever disclaimers, or lack thereof, that they want.

So then the only way to avoid AI is to only listen to old music from the 70s, 80s, whatever, and never listen to anything new ever again. Because you'll never be sure if AI is involved in the making of it.

And your claim that you can ALWAYS tell when something is AI is bull shit. You can't. No one cab.

So get off your f**king high horse already. It's getting old and I'm tired of it.

[enCiphered]

let us create a worst case scenario.
Today 100.000+ uploads every day on Spotify, tomorrow 10 Mio uploads every day (= 10 Mio Copyright Infringements every day, there won't be copyright any more, wouldn't make any sense).
A mass product will turn into a mass product, more or less nothing will change.
Don't upload any of your music on the internet, AI will absorb and use it., don't even send audio files via email (big brother=ai is watching you!). Use cassette tapes and share it with people you trust only. AI will be able to store every (possible) song b eforehand, also a song that has not even been created or composed yet by a human, so every released song made 100% by a human will be theoretecally a Copyright Infringement. Every song already exists in the AI world of endless combinations, song arrangements, instrument solos and possibilities). AI vs human beings. AI will rule, unfortunately. We will become sl@ves.

What you’re describing isn’t really about AI. It’s about the collapse of filters and the loss of shared standards.

AI just makes it impossible to keep pretending that the old ones still work.
When everyone can produce endlessly, music stops being scarce but that doesn’t make it meaningless. It just means the bottleneck moves from making to choosing. From skill alone to taste, intent and context. That’s uncomfortable, yes. Especially if you grew up believing that effort automatically earned respect.

And I think the Spotify mess isn’t proof that art is dead. It’s proof that platforms aren’t curators. They never were. They’re logistics companies optimizing engagement and now AI fits that logic perfectly. That doesn’t erase human music but buries it unless new filters emerge.

Regarding everything already exists.. well, this isn’t true in any human sense that matters. Expression isn’t a math space. A song isn’t just a combination of notes. It’s a decision made by someone, somewhere, for a reason. AI can imitate outcomes, not stakes.

The real danger isn’t that humans become slaves or that virtuosity disappears. The danger is that nothing distinguishes care from noise unless we actively build distinctions again, socially and culturally.

Cassette tapes won’t save that. Neither will denial.
Only taste, curation and communities that still give a damn will.

[ghettosynth]

An article on "Poisoned AI" I found interesting.
https://www.zdnet.com/article/ai-model- ... ing-signs/

Some of the things I heard before mentioned by others on KVR.
The question arises of how this relates to music and whether your creation is truly yours or just following triggered responses made by those "bad actors" steering through the back door.

This is not really much of a threat to music outputs. It's certainly possible, but there are few economic incentives. The article is summarizing a research result and, as usual, does so with something of an attention bias. For the attack to go un-noticed it must be small and specific. Probabilistically, you are already at greater risk without AI. You can be sued if your song sounds too much like someone else's, even if it's not intentional. As a human, you are VERY likely to incorporate learned motifs into your music. That is, in the sense that this works, your mind is already poisoned.

The only safe thing to do is to stop releasing music.

[enCiphered]

Spotify does not directly generate its own AI music, but the platform hosts a significant amount of AI-generated content and is actively working on AI tools with major labels (from Google AI search!)

A lot of music for media (background music for games/films) could be generated by AI, a lot of this stuff is pretty generic anyway and could be described in words (all you need)- people who may films/TV may be able to generate a proportion of their own backgrounds/folly etc with ease. That doesn't mean they will want to however...It will I think affect music 'producers' more than and jobbing musicians or songwriters/composers (people still want to go and see real people play real instruments live)

You can generate just about any picture you want know just by describing it with words, but people still take photographs...people enjoy playing instruments (tactile connection) and humans ultimate determine what is 'good' art (and what is slop) however it was generated!

I mostly agree with the direction, but I think the risk is understated. AI won’t just replace generic background music, it will redefine what counts as acceptable quality for those use-cases. Once good enough becomes instant, cheap and infinite, the economic floor for a lot of applied music work collapses, even if the art itself doesn’t.

Photography survived, yes. But the profession changed radically. Fewer people make a living from it, while more people do it recreationally. I suspect music is heading the same way.

Live performance, tactility and human presence will still matter but mostly outside the algorithmic platforms. Spotify doesn’t reward intention or embodiment, it rewards scale and engagement patterns. That’s where AI fits disturbingly well.

So I don’t think AI decides what’s good art, humans still do but platforms increasingly decide what gets seen. And that distinction matters more than whether the sound came from a human hand or a prompt.

[teilo]

I ask.again and again, how could you play in the NBA if you couldn't play basketball better than average or even not at all?!

No one will answer you because the question is irrelevant and nonsensical. Music is not remotely analogous to professional sports.

And if you had to blind test AI vs human with some well-chosen tracks that were completely new to you, you would fail. And as for hybrid music - a combination of human composition and AI - there is no way in the world you would be able to tell which included AI elements and which did not.

So I'm going to embrace AI in my music where it makes sense to do so, rather than freaking out about the New Bad Thing that we must all shun if we are to be true musicians.