Opinion: The Future is GenAI-Enabled

[This article is the opinion of the author, and does not necessarily reflect the opinion of CreativePro Network and its employees.] It’s an exciting time to be a human, though exciting times are almost always scary. We’re once again living through the birth of a massive disruptive technology that will change the lives of a large percentage of the world’s population — putting people out of work, creating new jobs that never existed before, upending longstanding habits and accepted norms. I’m talking, of course, about all the new tools of artificial intelligence, such as ChatGPT, DALL-E, midjourney, and so on — collectively called Generative AI (GenAI). I know many artists and writers are deeply troubled by the implications of GenAI, and for good reason: this technology is a direct blow to their livelihoods and will put many of them out of work. In a wide variety of fields — from art to writing to music — it can generate almost as well as a human. In fact, in some cases it’s even better. In the coming decade, GenAI will change the world as much as the automobile, as much as television, as much as the personal computer itself. It’s hard to imagine a time before there were paved roads for cars everywhere, or the ability to broadcast an image… But it’s worth remembering that each of these new technologies destroyed lives and careers, just as they created new opportunities. Marc Andreessen once quipped that in the future there will be two kinds of jobs: those in which people tell computers what to do, and those in which people are told what to do by computers. We’re seeing that unfold today, in the brave new world of GenAI.

Here We Go Again

This kind of upheaval and upset is not new, of

course, even in creative fields. I lived through another of these “disruptive technology” moments, back in the late 1980’s, when a funny little computer called an Apple Macintosh was combined with an odd-looking desktop laser printer, and suddenly almost anyone could put high-quality type on a page. “Typesetting,” as it was called back then, had previously been accessible to only a few, highly trained artisans. They called this new technology a “toy,” and insisted it would never replace them… until it did, of course. They grumbled, as they shuttered their shops, that it wasn’t as good, that people and quality mattered, that it was unfair. Where are they now? Some grumbled themselves off into the sunset, I suppose. But others jumped on the bandwagon and helped the new technology grow and flourish. Some typesetters joined or started software companies, others used their skills to teach. Some said, “well, if graphic designers can now be typesetters, then we typesetters can now be graphic designers!” Because in any period of disruptive tech, the disrupted people who ultimately succeed the greatest understand that change is inevitable, it’s not fair, and the way forward involves two things: learning how to incorporate the new reality into their own lives, and helping others do their jobs better. My friend Justin Putney, an accomplished programmer in his own right, recently wrote that he had been experimenting with GenAI for coding: write a good prompt and it can respond in the programming language of your choice. While he admits that this ability will put people out of work, he also notes that, as a professional, “it will save me real time and make me real money.” To me, this is the key: GenAI will solve as many problems as it creates, and the people who stand to win the most are those who engage, not dismiss. I believe Mr. Andreessen was wrong… There is a third option for work: People who tell computers what to do, listen to how they respond, and then choose intelligently. In this future, the best work of all will include a conversation. ===

Q&A With the Author

In re-reading my own piece above, I’m concerned that I may come across a bit too heartless, as though I don’t care about the livelihood of creatives. I want to emphasize that nothing could be farther from the truth. I’ve spent my whole career trying to help design professionals succeed, and I believe deeply in the value of good art, design, and communication. So with that in mind, let me answer a few direct questions:

Q: Is GenAI based on theft and exploitation?

A: Absolutely, but no more than what computers and people have been doing throughout history. Algorithms that play chess or Go are based on “stealing” moves of other players. Military leaders study and steal campaigns. Writers learn to write by reading and studying other writers’ work in depth. Commercial musicians have always written music based on other musicians’ distinctive sound. Artists have copied other artists and their style as long as art has existed. In fact, human artists are often trained with methods very similar to how GenAI companies train their software: look closely, deconstruct, try it yourself, fail, correct, do it again until it feels right. No one complains that their phone can take such good photographs, and yet that ability is largely based on AI that has learned from billions of other images what humans like and don’t like. Why does Siri, auto-captioning for accessibility, and other speech recognition work so well? Because of the billions of personal conversations that have been “stolen” and analyzed by AI teams. The point is that people (and computers) learn from what has come before, and then create based on that. GenAI is only different in its scale—how much it has ingested, how quickly it has learned, and how virtually anyone can use it to do what only a few could before.

Q: Should artists be compensated?

A: I have very mixed feelings about this. On the one hand, artists and writers have never really been compensated when other humans have studied their work. On the other hand, they are often compensated when people copy or adapt their work. Is GenAI studying-and-learning or copying/adapting? From what I can tell, it’s the former. It may appear like pieces of art or writing are copied directly, but that’s rarely what’s going on. The art or writing has been analyzed, broken down into pixels and words, and then is built up again from scratch, based on probability and relationship. I hate to say it, but it is surprisingly like what the human brain does when creating on a blank canvas. That said, there is a fundamental problem with Generative AI: if artists stop creating, then the AI can no longer evolve, and everyone suffers. So I do think there should be some legal and financial ramifications for OpenAI and other GenAI companies. Here are a couple ideas:

• 1% of their revenues should go to a fund to help as many human students as possible become better artists, writers, and creators.
• Creators should have the right to remove their name from any and all GenAI tools so that if someone prompts “create something in the style of…” then the tool would say: “I don’t know who that person is.” Alternatively, creators could negotiate with companies to include their name and likeness in the software, much like well-known sports figures are paid to be represented in games.

Q: Can AI be copyrighted?

I’m no lawyer, but I think the answer is almost certainly yes because — and this is really important — a human is prompting software tools to create something new. Think about it this way: You can open Photoshop, open a blank image, and choose Filter > Render > Fibers, right? The result is a computer-generated texture. Run a few more filters and edits on it, and it quickly becomes unique, created by you, and copyrighted. GenAI is exactly the same, times a million. The art begins with an intention, and ends with a choice: your choice, as a human, to say, “that’s good; I’m done.”

Q: Shouldn’t we fight these “unethical” AI companies who are putting artists out of work?

A: The question of whether companies or organizations can or should be held responsible for how people use (or abuse) their tools is a fascinating one. Should the automobile industry be responsible for the environmental disaster of roads and air quality? Should a company that makes a plastic tool be responsible for pollution in the oceans? Should Adobe be responsible when someone uses Photoshop for illegal or unethical purposes? I’d say the answer to all of these is: no, but they should find ways to help solve the problems. Adobe, for example, has been heavily involved in the Content Authenticity Initiative. Ultimately, no one can stop Generative AI — any more than the typesetters could stop Apple from letting people typeset their own designs, the radio artists could stop television, acoustic musicians could stop synthesizers, or artisanal cottage industries could stop the industrial revolution of the 18th and 19th centuries. I don’t mean to point fingers, but if you’ve ever booked travel online, you’ve helped put a human travel agent out of work. If you’ve used an ATM, you helped fire human bank tellers. If you caught an Uber or Lyft ride, you helped put a professional taxi driver out of work. Of course, each of these disruptive technologies also created many new jobs and opportunities. More importantly, they democratized the work—almost anyone can do these things now. Remember that drummers hated the invention of the drum machine—which was supposed to put them out of jobs—but there are still percussionists today, many of whom love using their drum machines!

Q: What’s coming next?

A: Generative AI will touch nearly everyone in the industrialized world:

• Many (if not most) screen actors will be replaced by photorealistic animations that can look, sound, and act like anything the writer and director wants.
• Musicians will increasingly rely on GenAI to create their music, and GenAI music will increasingly be used for commercial purposes instead of human-written music. (After all, when you ask a GenAI for “more cowbell” they don’t scowl at you!)
• GenAI will be used to retouch images (you’ll be able to literally say “make him smile 10% more” or “make her look toward the camera” and the image will change), build 3D models, create animations, and more.
• Even now, GenAI can write more compelling social media posts better than many people, and can communicate instructions more clearly than most human writers.
• Language translators love sharing funny examples of really poor AI-translations, but every year that goes by the AI gets better and the humans laugh a little less.
• While it’s not specifically GenAI, I think it’s worth pointing out that almost everyone who drives for a living will be out of a job in the coming decades. (It’s already clear that computers can fly airplanes significantly more safely than humans.)

It’s true that GenAI will replace humans, but so did VisiCalc and Excel. (In fact, did you know that a century ago, the word “computer” referred to a person who did computation? All those “computers” were replaced, and no one today wants to grow up to make a living as a “computer.”)

Q: This is so depressing! What can I do?

A: No one likes change, especially massive upheavals that affect our livelihoods. It’s a horrible feeling that what we love to do — what we’ve invested time and energy and money in — could soon be rendered obsolete. But you’re not powerless over your own choices. Here are some reminders and suggestions that may help in the coming years:

• Never forget the power and resilience of human creativity.
• Play with this stuff and see what you enjoy! The more you play and learn, the more ways you’ll find to thrive in this new world. (Conversely, sticking your head in the sand and hoping it will go away is a surefire path toward obsolescence.)
• Find ways to solve people’s problems. That’s one thing humans can do that AI can’t. Look for human problems and solve them creatively and human-ly.
• Look for the weaknesses. Every technology has its limits; where are the holes in GenAI? What work is still to be done?
• Focus on the unique and artisanal. What can you make that GenAI can’t?
• In the end, you want to be the one prompting the GenAI and choosing when it’s done. Your trained eye will help with both of these.

Remember that the biggest difference between humans and A.I. is this: intention. GenAI has no need to create any more than a self-driving car has a desire to drive from one place to another. You do.

Q: What about the creators?

A: This, then, comes to the most important point of all: GenAI allows more people to be creators. Just as I can make type look beautiful on a page today because of Apple’s disruptive technology in the 1980s, GenAI will let billions of other people create, design, ideate, edit, build, and “dream out loud.” There is an old myth that goes like this: “If everyone can ______, then ______ will no longer be special.” But that idea, based on scarcity and “zero-sum” thinking, has been proven wrong, time and time again. The reality is much more complicated and interesting. Today, fonts and design are a bigger industry than ever because what was a rarefied ability is now at so many people’s fingertips. Creativity has not suffered, and will not suffer, just because computers can do things better than people.