Thoughts on genAI

These tech bros who love to push new tech like genAI love to talk about "the future" and how this kind of thing is pushing us more "into the future"... But what does that future actually look like? They're trying to sell you on the idea that this kind of tech and how its being used will lead us to that utopia future everyone used to dream about. Chrome everywhere, flying cars, clean air, happiness... Tomorrowland, basically. But that's not what I see coming from this. GenAI, as it currently stands, is trying to take art and creativity away from people and put it in the hands of corporations. The future that will lead to is a bleak one, in my opinion.

Imagine with me: All art is now owned by corporations. All creative expression comes with a price tag. You want to be an artist? That's a computer's job now, get back to work doing the menial labor meant for humans. You don't need to express yourself anymore, the computer can do it for you. Get back to work. Besides, all the art we'll be seeing is the same smoothed out sanitized corporate approved drivel. It won't make you think, it won't make you feel, it won't inspire you. You don't need those things anyways, GET BACK TO WORK.

You see, art is not and never has been about the end result. Art is about the process. Art is about expressing yourself and hopefully making other people feel something as well. Ask any artist and I can almost guarantee you they'll tell you that the best compliment they could get is making someone cry with their art. Happy, sad, doesn't matter. Tears come from powerful emotions and if your art (visual, musical, performance, writing, etc) can move someone to tears, you've made it to the top. That's successful art right there. It's not about money, its about feelings. Stifling our ability to make art is no different than limiting our language. That warning was given to us a LONG time ago. Please please PLEASE go read 1984. I can't believe these warnings were given to us so long ago and we decided use it as a template to model ourselves after instead. For those who haven't read it yet, there is a character whose job it is to help rewrite the dictionary. They are removing "unnecessary" words and simplifying words. Why do we need words like "better", "best", "great", "awesome", and "amazing" or "worse", "worst", "terrible", and "horrible", not to mention that those last examples are so negative and who wants that? Lets make it easier! "Good" is our base word. Need more? Plus good. Double plus good. Nedd an opposite? Ungood. Plus ungood. Double plus ungood. That's it! That's all we need! But the point being made, ultimately, is that limiting language then limits thought and self expression. I think the same concept is what is happening with genAI trying to take over art. If we put all of our creative output through a machine, we will get limited results, which will ultimately limit our ability to express ourselves and to think for ourselves.

Back to my previous point about art not being about the end result. To corporations (and these tech bros are absolutely corporate shills), everything is about profit. How can they make money off of this? And it has absolutely infuriated them for the longest time that art was so hard to monetize. It wasn't fair to them! Artists are out here making SOOO much money from art (untrue) and it's not even a real job (untrue)! Artists are just playing and having fun and getting paid to do it! Unfair! Angry face! Toddler stomping temper tantrum! See, they think we're "gatekeeping creativity" or some nonsense, which isn't true. They think they've been screwed over because they weren't born with "talent", when in reality, almost every artist ever wasn't born shitting out masterpieces. The truth is, we all just have this insatiable urge to create. And with that urge, came practice. That's it. Take me, for example, since I hate to speak for others if I can help it. As a small child, I just really wanted to draw cats. So much. So I did. I drew cats. I drew kittens. I drew them everywhere. Over and over and over again. I got in trouble for drawing so much. I got made fun of for drawing so much. I wasn't even good at it! I wish I had some old childhood drawings to show you. I was terrible. Not only that, I was usually drawing the same cats in the exact same pose. OVER AND OVER AND OVER. You know what that's called? Obsession. Yes, but also it's called practice. I hate to break it to you but that is the true secret to art. It's Practice. You have to be okay with sucking at something if you want to eventually be good at something. And you have to be okay with sucking at for a long time. Even lifetime artists eventually learn new things... and we suck at it! But corporations? Tech bros? They don't want to spend time learning and practicing. It's not profitable. There's no money in learning something. There is only money in output. So instead, they made output machines and tried to convince you it's art. It is not art. It will never be art. It sure is an image or words or whatever. But there is no meaning behind it. There is no feeling. There is no time and love and practice. There is no blood, sweat, and tears. It is empty and hollow, because that is all a corporation can make. Hollow nothingness.

Xenon Fox, 12/20/2025