Meaning
The one thing AI will always struggle to create. No matter how good it gets.
This isn't an anti-AI piece. I think AI has genuine value and can create things that are going to re-shape our world; plenty of it will be for the better, but of course there are such things as absolutes in macro changes to our environment.
I recorded the video below a couple of months ago, reflecting on how people were beginning to talk about “taste” as the antidote to AI.
I don’t mind that word, but I don’t think it fully captured what it means to be creative and to produce creative work.
And the difference in creative work? Is this word instead: meaning
Art = meaning and when we create art and share it with people, we have a chance to build an experience richer than what was possible without our creation and without the people.
AI cannot, in my mind, create true meaning like artists do, because there needs to be something human made and a human interaction for true meaning to exist.
If you’re curious to learn more, read on!
In this article:
A worst-case scenario thought experiment for the future of creativity
Why we can all, always find 100 people who care.
The difference between manufacturing art and creating it
Why functional creativity is more at risk than meaningful creative work
What AI is actually good at, and why that should help you, not scare you
The worst-case scenario
Imagine the worst-case scenario for creative people, just for a moment. A dystopian future where technology has taken over. It makes incredibly high-quality creative work, autonomously. Creative people, like everyone else, have been displaced.
Pretty easy to imagine. It’s already happening. But imagine we’re five years in and things got worse, not better. Worst case scenario is good here. Unemployment is high. People have gotten used to AI creativity on mainstream distribution.
In that world, let’s imagine you kept showing up with your hard-won creative skills. You kept writing and publishing. Drawing and photographing and making handmade flip books and filming on 8mm cameras, playing your aged, beaten nylon string guitar. Real creative work. Every day, all the way through this future. You kept sharing stories, sharing art, connecting with people.
You kept showing up. Most days the algorithm didn’t help you out. People ignored you. You showed up anyway.
In this world, where mainstream creative work is generated by AI, do you think you could still get 100 humans into a room to hear you sing that new set of songs on your nylon string guitar and talk about the album you just made?
Could you get 100 people into a room where you’re showcasing your mix of photography and illustrations? Could you get 100 people to watch your 8mm short film and run a live podcast recording?
I think you could.
I think even if you had a tiny audience online and a small group of friends, you could get the word out and 100 people could realistically show up for you. Pay for a ticket. Buy some merch or even some of your work.
Art equals meaning
Why do I believe that? Because art equals meaning.
And this is why no matter what happens, no matter how good AI gets at mimicking humans, you can’t create meaning if you are a fraud (and yes, I do believe AI tools are currently being used to create knock-offs of genuine creative work).
AI is trying to manufacture art. Humans create pieces of art. Manufacturing is the mass creation and distribution of a utility. Art is something with story, depth, feeling, and connection.
AI can manufacture all it wants. While the rest of us create things that mean something to us, and therefore have the chance, if we give it the chance, to create meaning for others.
You can also find this video on our YouTube channel, where we publish all our video essays. Watch on YouTube
But people are already forming bonds with AI?
That is true. And while these might feel meaningful, they are distinctly different than the interaction between artist, their creation and the audience.
Parasocial relationships, where humans develop a connection to people they don’t know, that’s a thing. People are already forming attachments to AI avatars.
Will we see more of this? Sure.
Will there be people in the future who are comfortable consuming AI-generated art? Absolutely.
Our world does not cater for absolutes. AI will not replace human creativity, and human creativity will never eradicate AI either.
People are going to get fooled. They will listen to songs and watch shows that they don’t know are AI. Some people will follow AI-generated avatars with all their fandom, just like they might today.
Parasocial relationships will, I believe, keep growing.
But this is not a replacement of you, the artist or what you make.
I think that’s so often been the fear in a creative person: that I can just be replaced. If I don’t do all the right stuff then another creative person will get the fame and notoriety and the career. We are so used to living in scarcity that we assume something else will win out instead of us.
But that’s why it’s up to us, individually, to ignore that noise. To keep creating. Keep working on our craft. And if people aren’t paying attention, we should find some ways to help them pay attention. I say help them because it’s up to us to create ways they can experience our work.
And I’m sure of this: humans are going to want a lot more active experiences with human-made art and creators. Which means getting out of our comfort zones more often.
This is about the wonders of real human art, and people that care about art. We want to feel like we have a connection to the art. The story it brings us. The emotional spectrum it helps us reach; from elation to deep sorrow, art allows us to feel the full spectrum of human experience.
Art sees us in ways that we sometimes don’t see ourselves.
Functional versus meaningful
We’ve just come through a phase where creativity was increasingly being categorised by function. Major music distributors, for example, began to realise that people might want a set of songs for going to the gym or relaxing at night. But functional creativity I think is more likely to be passively consumed.
Real fans of art don’t want passive. They want active experiences. They want the gigs, the community, to see it and experience it.
I do wonder if functional creativity may find itself being replaced by AI a lot more. The lo-fi genre is in my mind more at risk than, say a folk artist. We’re going to want to see the human skill more. We’re going to want to see the blemishes and adjustments. We’re going to want less perfectly polished and more real.
This is all I’ve ever wanted. The overpolished lip-synced set, no matter how good a visual performance might be on display; if you can’t perform your own art then you’ve lost sight of what art is.
What this means for artists
I have hope for creativity. I think artists off all kinds are going to have to spend more time on their skills. I think more time on the experiences they come up with for fans. Because art itself is a journey to create. And the ways we share it with people are just as important, if not more important, going into the future.
Artists are going to need to be more creative than ever. And braver than ever. No more hiding behind a couple of social media accounts and the algorithm. Artists will need to stand up, stand tall, create experiences, invite people in, show up in the world, perform, work with others.
I’m honestly excited for this because this was the creative industries before the last decade, and I think we lost a lot of that along the way.
A predictive engine designed to mimic humanity cannot do that because humanity is not an equation. That’s why even though I look right now and see some possibilities that honestly scare me, and I’m not easily scared by technology or exploring futurism.
Aspects of AI do scare me. But when I find myself scared about something, I like to pause and consider a worst case scenario. In that future, where humans have been cast aside and the world predominantly consumes AI-generated work, there will always be a place for human creativity.
Because in a world devoid of meaning, which is the entire human experience, I can only imagine that a quiet revolution would brew. The thing that was once in oversupply suddenly becomes the scarcest thing on the planet.
Everybody is going to want art. Everybody is going to be craving human-made creativity.
One last thought on AI
Don’t forget about the stuff it’s actually really good at. Stuff that artists often put off. It’s great at research, crafting a document, building out a strategy to get your art into the world.
As someone who’s been playing in bands my whole life but also built a career on the business side of creativity, artists won’t get replaced. But that skill set of mine might. And I’m OK with that.
Because at the end of the day the only thing I’ve ever cared about is people getting their art into the world. And AI can actually help with the monotonous admin tasks. Just don’t let it touch the creative side. Your thoughts and ideas need to be your own.
I think in the future the job of the artist might just get more important. As more people ask “what’s next?” in every corner of the world, more people will turn to the one place that can give them a sense of being understood.
Human artists, that make human art, create meaning.
And that’s why I still believe in the future of creativity and that there is nothing more important than the human-made art you make.
A few questions to sit with:
How might this change the way you think about using AI in your creative practice?
What do you think it means for how you build relationships with your audience?
If you could only get 100 people in a room for your work in the future, what would you want them to experience?
Ready for more?
Read Next: Creative careers sure don't work like they used to.
If you’d like more where this came from, why not try out Part 1 of our series on the future of creative careers.
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I love this conversation. It gets me so jazzed for working with artists. Can’t wait for your first summit. I will be so happy to share it with my audience because this is what we need right now. We need artists to band together to remind the world and ourselves how valuable Our creativity is.