"Artificial Intelligence" As A Tool

Introduction

I wasn't sure about writing this, I know people who have said they would use "AI" to create their Vocal stories but this is about the "AI" that I use when I create my stories.

Two points I would like to make:

1. It is a tool. It is artificial but it is not intelligent, it is just very fast, far faster than I could ever be for many tasks.
2. Also "Why would I read what you couldn't be bothered to write?"

Using the Tool - The Pictures

I was accused of plagiarism a few times for using acknowledged internet images that were not from Unsplash in my stories, so I discovered Nightcafe which I now use for most of my pictures.

One artist said that AI was taking away their livelihood, but seriously if I wanted a piece of art I would employ an artist. For Vocal stories, I looked for pictures I could use with an acknowledgement or my own photographs and drawings (I am not an artist). When I generate images using Nightcafe sometimes the images are near perfect for what I want, and sometimes they are so bad that I have to delete them and look elsewhere for images. As often as not hands have more than four fingers and a thumb, I have been given six-legged horses and dogs, so those can't be used.

So as I say artificial, fast but hardly intelligent although it's a lot better now than it used to be. This is an article detailing my early work for my Vocal images:

Using the Tool - The Words

For creative writing "AI" in my opinion is a no-no and I think the phrase "Why would I read what you couldn't be bothered to write?" sums the situation up perfectly.

I think it could be used to generate ideas and scenarios but the writing has to be by you.

I do think that "AI" can be used for system documentation, but the final output would need to be checked by a human. I was once tricked (not maliciously) into publishing an AI-generated poem. I thought it was OK but a bit wooden. This is it, I didn't mark it as AI because that option was not there when first published but it became just an article to show what the poetry was like.

Using the Tool - The Music

This is the scariest section for me. I have always used a YouTube video either by a band or a singer or even me, but this time last year I became a Great Uncle and wrote a welcome poem for my Great Nephews. I wanted some music to go with it but could not find anything appropriate.

I do like to give the reader something to listen to while they read my work and I discovered Suno. I think my friend Lee (see that poem above) had shared something with me so I tried it and was shocked at the results using my poem. My sister Yvonne and niece Gemma loved it. It's not perfect just very good. You can check it out here:

Then I created an original one for the Vocal "Harmonic Verses" Challenge and thought I would perform myself and then use Suno.

I listened to the first Suno one and then realised my poem had a spelling mistake, I had written "dakness" instead of "darkness". When you listen you may not notice it, but I did, but thought I could change the text associated with the production which it allowed me today but did not change the recording, so I had to redo it which, despite the same parameters resulted in a different sound.

Someone recently refused to even look at the article because I used som "AI" in it and you may feel the same, but without my words those productions could not exist.

My friend Nicola says the singer sounds like the guy from Slipknot but you can check that out here:

Conclusion

To me, these are all tools but can be annoying in the wrong hand. If used as tools they are fine. Think about your computer. You press a key then that is translated via wires and software to appear on your screen and be recorded somewhere in the ether that is the internet. Is that acceptable? It is, because without it we could not do what we do on Vocal. Should we go back to typewriters or pen and paper?

The same with art and music, there are amazing digital artists out there, should they return to canvas, and should musicians ditch their amplifiers, sequencers and recording equipment? I think not.

We must not be complacent.

Thank you so much for reading.