Aspiring writers, artists and musicians using AI need to be aware users will be charged

[highplainsdem]

for the better versions very soon, if they aren't already being charged.

ChatGPT Plus was launched yesterday, at $20/mo, and an even better version, ChatGPT Professional, is being tried out by a small set of users, and although I don't believe there's been a formal announcement of its price, the one I've seen mentioned on a number of sites is $42/mo.

Trying to hook people with free samples is an ancient marketing strategy.

From Mashable yesterday:

https://mashable.com/article/openai-paid-version-chatgpt-plus

-snip-

The pilot subscription plan gives users access to ChatGPT during peak times and faster response times (which is helpful because it breaks down a lot) and priority access to new features and improvements. It will cost you $20 per month.

"The research preview for ChatGPT allowed us to learn from real world use, and we’ve made important improvements and updates based on feedback," an OpenAI spokesperson said in an email to Mashable. They added that the plan is currently only available in the U.S., but additional countries will be added soon.

You can start using it by signing up for the ChatGPT Plus waitlist, which is not the same thing as the waitlist OpenAI sent out for ChatGPT Professional in early January. The company said it would begin inviting people from the waitlist in the coming weeks. There's also a separate waitlist for another offering OpenAI plans to launch specifically for developers called ChatGPT API, OpenAI said in a blog post. The company added that it is "actively exploring options for lower-cost plans, business plans, and data packs for more availability."

The version of ChatGPT most widely used was launched in December 2022 and has already made some pretty sophisticated changes to how many of us live and work. It helps people date, write essays, and even create malware (not great). It is also ethically dubious, and its growth — unhampered by any regulations — has some people concerned. Those people might not be on Twitter, though, because that site seems excited as hell to give ChatGPT Plus a try.

I hadn't read before today that ChatGPT is being used to create malware. I agree with Mashable's "not great" parenthetical comment on that.

I'm not sure exactly which differences will exist in the pricing tiers to pressure users to pay. But if you want to see the direction it's likely to move, look at the sorts of things Elon Musk - one of the founders of OpenAI, creator of ChatGPT - has been doing with Twitter.

Btw, aspiring writers, artists and musicians hoping AI will bring them commercial success and fame need to be aware that those professions have always operated through filters - agents, editors, producers, record labels, galleries, and so on.

Newcomers' work, and even their query letters asking if they should submit work, typically end up in what is usually called the slush pile. It's called that because most of what's in it is dreck and it's always been a chore for those assigned to the slush pile to get through it, before sending back a reply, most often a standard rejection letter. Ray Bradbury received hundreds of rejection letters before selling his first published story.

ChatGPT will increase those slush piles by orders of magnitude. Making the odds of ever getting out of them, unless you can make the right connections, much worse for aspiring artists.

Especially if the people who are those filters do not want to approve AI-generated work, and there are no good tools for automatically detecting and rejecting it, to weed it out. If anything, AI-generated submissions are likely to make them more likely to rely on established artists if they're determined to promote and sell work created by humans rather than AI. Finding great new talent in a slush pile was always like searching for a diamond needle in a haystack. AI-generated submissions will make that a mountain-sized haystack.

Maybe a teacher with connections in the industry and a reputation for honesty will be able to help you out. Someone who can vouch for your genuine talent and recommend it.

Otherwise, you're competing for attention with what could be hundreds of thousands if not millions of submissions, most of them AI-generated or at least AI-assisted.

You're also competing, if you use AI to create, with people who can afford more expensive AI than you can afford.

So don't be surprised if we suddenly learn how "creative" billionaires are, if AI-generated writing and music and art become acceptable.

[dalton99a]

1. Which is why Silicon Valley investors are flocking to AI

AI is where the action is at

[highplainsdem]

3. Yes.

[FalloutShelter]

2. Artists paying money to suicide their own creativity....

Brilliant.



As an artist, I find this both brain and soul deadening.

[highplainsdem]

4. I agree completely.

[ZonkerHarris]

5. Paying a robot to rip off other human artists.

[highplainsdem]

8. Yep.

[Iggo]

6. Oh, to be a copyright lawyer.

[highplainsdem]

9. They'll be busy.

[harumph]

7. What is on streaming networks (written by humans) is mostly shit.

AI is just going to make the shit come out faster and of course, our education bereft citizenry
will lap it up to the delight of the shareholders. It doesn't need to be great (just passable). It's not only a disaster for creatives,
it's a disaster for anyone producing work with their mind. More specifically, it's not a disaster because the
product is superior (it won't be) - just that AI is vastly more prolific than humans and frankly, the public by and large
having substandard educations don't understand nuance and depth.

If I were a musician, writer or visual artist - I'd be copyrighting the most granular aspects of my work legally possible.

"Declines in vocabulary among American adults within levels of educational attainment, 1974–2016"
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0160289618302198

Like you, HPD - I hate this shit.