Bandcamp Bans AI Generated Music - Music - Forums : Best Ever Albums

MadhattanJack

Just to end the list

Gender: Male

Romanelli wrote:

There are absolutely ways to determine if music is AI generated or not. Those tools are actually easy to find. I use them myself. Do some research and find them instead of assuming that they do not exist. They do.

If I'm not mistaken, they do this by analyzing the waveforms to to find tell-tale digital "artifacts" and "signatures," so those are indeed easy to find, but I think we also have to assume the AI companies are going to do their best to clean that stuff up, assuming that's possible.

The reaction in the Reddit thread (where I guess they posted the announcement simultaneously) looks to be almost universally positive, but one or two people are asking what terms like "substantially" and "heavy reliance" mean, which is to say they probably don't completely trust either humans or computers to flag this stuff without generating false positives. Also, it looks like some people aren't convinced that the software used to find the digital artifacts can tell the difference between fully AI-generated and something recorded using 100% digital samples (Hatsune Miku was mentioned as an example).

I know a lot of people would love to see BEA totally ban AI music too, and TBH that wouldn't bother me much at all, personally. I would only say that these other sites (including Bandcamp) are almost certainly doing it not because the music sucks, but because they're being overwhelmed by it in the form of automated spam-tune uploads by people trying to make quick-easy cash at the expense of human musicians. That may be reason enough in itself to ban it, but since BEA isn't a commercial streaming/download site, and it would be very difficult to program a spam AI to enter these things into charts automatically (they're not going to spend money to hire humans to do it), banning that stuff here might be an overreaction, at least at this point.

Romanelli

Bone Swah

Gender: Male

Location: Broomfield, Colorado

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Tap wrote:

I'm aware that those things exist, but BC are not open at all about what (if any) they'd be using. This feels like an awful lot of good faith to be giving to a union busting company!! They could stay true to everything they've written here by never testing any reported music and acting purely on vibes. This should be concerning!

Whatever, dude. I don't know what inside information you may or probably may not have about how Bandcamp does business. Frankly, I don't care. And they don't have to tell YOU what means they are using to determine AI content. You've basically wasted the entire first page of this thread with nothing but personal speculation.

You said in your post right before this one that

"They have no mechanisms for actually detecting when music uses AI. This is going to suck." And then you claim to know that "those things exist". Make up your mind, man.

The fact is, Bandcamp is addressing it. This is a good thing for music, and for all of us. Sorry you can't see that.
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Age: 40

I am not a dude or a man.

Apologies for being unclear, when I said that they have no mechanisms, I meant that they don't explain in their policy how an AI determination would be made. I'll refrain from wasting any further time on my baseless speculation and make room for all the uncritical celebration that this news deserves!!

Hayden

Location: Vietnam

It'll be messy, yeah, as is any launch, but it's a good move and I'm glad Bandcamp is making it.

For financial reasons, I imagine Spotify will do the same this year. Bandcamp doesn't generate money per stream, whereas Spotify is bound to be doling out buckets of money towards what could be funding a bot farm.

This is good, cool.

As much of a 'modern' person as I am, I've never used AI. I don't like it. I don't think it's useful to anything I do. And I think, on a society-based level, it could be devastating. I hope it's eventually looked upon almost like smoking. Cool once, yeah, edgy maybe, but ultimately bad for you and eventually given more of a 'yuck-factor'. I'm not an old man yelling at a cloud, but I'm keeping a distance away from it all—

I hate Googling stuff now. The amount of time, even as an uninformed person on some topics, I've read the AI summaries of subjects and seen unnecessary lies and errors... I mean... it's annoying, and possibly dangerous. If it eventually helps the science community, health community, etc etc, sure, I get it, but I don't think it will ever be majorly beneficial to the arts.

There's a lot of fun in the production of music. A sense of achievement when the final cut's made. Surely AI must take away from that... it's not like cheating on a math test — cheating on art is a very weird state of mind —
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Johnnyo

Gender: Male

Age: 67

Location: London Town

Romanelli wrote:

At least it's there. At least Bandcamp is taking a stand. It's better than nothing.

I’m with romanelli on this one. I know a lot of musicians and many of them are really struggling at the moment. I am in no way suggesting that this is all down to AI, that would be absurd, but it must be playing a part.

At least bandcamp are trying. It’s not perfect but it’s a start in trying to help to protect artists.

I also want to make it clear that I am not anti AI. I think that, in the right hands, it has the potential to help us make the world a far better place. Unfortunately, too often, those with the power and influence are not using it for the betterment of mankind but to line there already, bulging pockets, but that a discussion for another time and place

Keep much in the hands of musicians where it belongs

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Gender: Female

Age: 40

So, to be clear, I don't think AI is good and it can never produce art because it isn't capable of hating what it does and wanting it to be better. And even as a tool used intentionally, it has lacked appeal for me. Although I did like this one

Models (2023) by Lee Gamble

I'm pretty curious what'll happen with ones like this, but I think that if this had to go at the expense of all the prompt generated music, it would be worth it. Because that stuff is terrible, and Bandcamp has a real interest in keeping it off their site.

But I want to question this point.

Johnnyo wrote:

It’s not perfect but it’s a start in trying to help to protect artists.

Is this trying to protect artists? Lets look at the facts, value neutral!

1. Bandcamp says that they do not allow music that has been made wholly or in substantial part by AI is not allowed on the platform.
2. Users are told to report music that they believe meets this criteria, but it can only be reported under "other"
3. The only sentence that is presented entirely in bold in the announcement is "We reserve the right to remove any music on suspicion of being AI-generated."

So on point 1, Bandcamp has implied that AI is ok if it is *less* than substantial, but it has not defined a line. Though it did suggest that a "heavy reliance on generative AI" would qualify as substantial. But this means that they have an arbitrary line that could be adjusted preferentially for larger artists.

And then on point 3, this means Bandcamp can never be wrong for deleting an album. Because even if they were wrong, they still suspected.

You mix in point 2, where ai reports get mixed into the slurry of other uncategorizable messages, and it seems like there's a good chance for mistakes to be made by Bandcamp with no recourse for the artists.

This doesn't feel like it's focused on protecting artists, tbh I don't even think it's worth protecting artists who compete with prompt music, like if that is actually your competition then I think it's just over for you and you're not gonna make it and you shouls just hang it up. But even if it was worth doing, this seems more like it's protecting the company than the artists.

MadhattanJack

Just to end the list

Gender: Male

Tap wrote:

This doesn't feel like it's focused on protecting artists, tbh I don't even think it's worth protecting artists who compete with prompt music, like if that is actually your competition then I think it's just over for you and you're not gonna make it and you shouls just hang it up.

Seems a bit harsh...? 😐

I doubt that anyone wants to compete with prompt music or AI in general, but practically everyone is being forced to, at least to some extent. And it's worse in some musical genres than it is in others (like ambient electronica, EDM, hyperpop, etc.) — some of the worst-affected genres might be ones that people actually like!

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Age: 40

MadhattanJack wrote:

Seems a bit harsh...? 😐

I doubt that anyone wants to compete with prompt music or AI in general, but practically everyone is being forced to, at least to some extent.

How? The only way I could see anyone being forced to compete with AI is on a page for like, genre tags? And I am not the least bit sorry to say that if someone browses this page and listens to a bit of some prompted music and then listens to a person's music, and decides "I am going to pay money to the prompt music", then that person is ngmi. If someone is replaceable by slop then honestly they were a part of the problem to begin with.

MadhattanJack

Just to end the list

Gender: Male

Tap wrote:

How? The only way I could see anyone being forced to compete with AI is on a page for like, genre tags? And I am not the least bit sorry to say that if someone browses this page and listens to a bit of some prompted music and then listens to a person's music, and decides "I am going to pay money to the prompt music", then that person is ngmi. If someone is replaceable by slop then honestly they were a part of the problem to begin with.

I actually use genre tags on Bandcamp all the time — in fact, I just assumed most people with genre-specific tastes do that, since there's no other way to separate stuff out by genre. (Is there?) Otherwise, I guess people get sent to Bandcamp mostly by offsite links from record reviews or the band's own website and social media pages... but AIs can do social media et al the same as humans can, or at least there's nothing to stop them that I'm currently aware of.

Bandcamp has recently been rolling out new "social features" to increase "engagement," which I assume is something the new corporate owners insisted on. Frankly none of them seem very useful to me, so far at least. (Everyone just be aware that if you get an e-mail suggesting that you join a Bandcamp "Club," those cost $13 a month, you only get one free album download each month, and you don't get to pick it yourself.)

Generally speaking, you're right that people who prefer AI slop to human-produced music are probably uncultivated vulgarians who are unlikely to go far in life, but remember what Michael Jordan once said: "Republicans wear sneakers too." As for musicians who are slop-replaceable, sure, maybe we'd all be better off with fewer of those. But like I mentioned earlier, some genres are being affected by this a lot worse than others. I can't say I like the idea of humans gradually abandoning those genres and letting the machines take over, just because a higher percentage of listeners can't tell the difference anymore.

Romanelli

Bone Swah

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Location: Broomfield, Colorado

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Tap wrote:

MadhattanJack wrote:

Seems a bit harsh...? 😐

I doubt that anyone wants to compete with prompt music or AI in general, but practically everyone is being forced to, at least to some extent.

How? The only way I could see anyone being forced to compete with AI is on a page for like, genre tags? And I am not the least bit sorry to say that if someone browses this page and listens to a bit of some prompted music and then listens to a person's music, and decides "I am going to pay money to the prompt music", then that person is ngmi. If someone is replaceable by slop then honestly they were a part of the problem to begin with.

Any time an artist is not heard because a listener has been fooled into listening to AI, it's a loss. Has ZERO to do with the quality of an artist. The competition is there, and it sucks. EVERYONE is replaceable by slop. The question is, do we want to at least show a fight against it happening, or just let it go because we think it might be inevitable?

For someone not in favor of AI, you seem to really be anti everything about this thread.
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I'm leaning on the threshold
Of her mystery
And crashing through the walls
Of dying history