From its potential to disrupt search to transforming brick-and-mortar retail, AI has dominated the conversation across the last several months. Few areas, perhaps, have seen more debate and conversation about AI’s impact than the creator economy.
From visual art to writing, AI is increasingly displaying its potential applications across a variety of endeavors that were previously thought to be exclusively “human” fields of expertise.
While much remains to be seen regarding how AI will impact creators as it continues to grow more advanced, some of the effects of this disruption are already being felt.
The rise of generative AI
When it comes to the creator economy and AI, the conversation is centered around the recent rise of generative AI. This is AI that is able to generate content, such as images, text, and even audio, in a matter of seconds. Generative AI has become more advanced with language learning models and image learning models in which it trains itself on already available content, then generates new content—all based on a simple prompt from a user.
As tools like Dall-E and ChatGPT have come into the limelight, generative AI has seen its popularity explode. It’s no longer merely considered a tool for website chatbots. Generative AI is now being used to generate custom images in a desired style, or to produce written content such as emails or social media posts.
While the streamlining of mundane tasks has generally been seen as a net positive in the business world, generative AI has met a fair amount of pushback in the creative space. Many artists have decried the use of AI as not being true art, and argued that its processes for learning from preexisting art amounts to plagiarism.
Ethical concerns over publishing AI art will undoubtedly continue to be a core focus of the arguments against generative AI for the foreseeable future. However, if we take a deeper look at how most creatives are actually utilizing AI, it appears that many of the fears and arguments from naysayers don’t hold as much weight as one might initially think.
How are creators actually using AI?
As with business owners, many creators are using AI to drive efficiency. Notably, in a survey from Lightricks, a creator-focused photo and video editing software company that has gone all-in on adding AI features, 84% of creators said they would be likely to use AI if it saved them time and money. Interestingly, many of these creators also report AI having a positive impact on their brand deals, with 40% earning more year-over-year since the rise of generative AI.
These survey results highlight how despite the way its vocal opponents may position it, the majority of creators actually view AI as a potential way of boosting their creativity. The ability to create content in a faster and more cost-effective manner can provide a powerful boost to a creator’s earning potential, giving them more opportunities to partner with brands and increase their income.
Notably, this gives further precedence to the argument of AI serving as a tool, rather than cutting creatives out of the picture entirely. For example, if you run an ad agency, generative AI allows for experimentation during the early stages of the creative process, which makes it easier to collect client feedback and preferences. Human artists then have clear guidelines as they get to work on a client project. Because everyone is already aligned, thanks to feedback on AI conceptualization, creatives don’t have to worry about client misunderstandings or putting in a lot of time and effort into work a client doesn’t actually want.
What does the future of AI hold for creators?
The exact ways that AI will change how creators work are still up for interpretation, especially when the tools themselves still need refining. On its own, current generative AI applications have proven themselves to be useful tools, but not a means of producing something that is 100% ready for the masses.
When it comes to written content, generative AI is still prone to plagiarism, clunky wording, and other issues. At the same time, it has been recognized as being able to remove “tedious” parts of the writing process. However, even when content is produced by AI, it still needs to be polished by an actual person.
Similarly, in graphic design, AI can struggle with understanding nuances, creating original content, and filtering biases. But it is strong at handling multiple variables and generating several variations on a prompt.
Because of this, Jasmine Oh, former product designer at Microsoft, argues, “The role of the designer will evolve from being creators to curators . . . Designers will become behavior or system designers. When the production side of design will be more or less automated by AI, it will be our goal to set parameters and goals for algorithms to determine the behavior of systems.”
Rather than focusing on the nitty-gritty side of production, many expect creators to focus on properly training AI to generate desired outcomes. Creators would then provide the final polish to make it ready for the masses.
While we’re not quite to this point yet, it’s clear that creators who train themselves on how to master these tools and become partners with AI will become more productive and better able to grow their careers.
Unleashing AI’s full potential for creators
We are still in the early stages of seeing what AI can do for creators.
For many aspiring creators, the introduction of AI will allow them to transform their ideas into reality in ways they might not have been able to otherwise. For existing creators, AI can streamline their productivity like never before, giving them more opportunities to connect with their followers or build relationships with brands.
As AI continues to evolve, it will be exciting to see how the creator economy will continue to adapt and thrive with this new tool.
Originally published at All Business Technology