As an artist, I think it is a net negative for us. Disregarding the copyright issue, I think it’s also consolidating power into large corporations, going to kill learning fundamental skills (rip next generation of artists), and turn the profession into a low skill minimum wage job. Artists that spent years learning and perfecting their skills will be worth nothing and I think it’s a pretty depressing future for us. Anways thoughts?
In particular, I think the problem is not the technology itself(it rarely is; in my opinion, it is always the application of the technology), in the same sense that advances in automation of production are. The problem is capitalism - under capitalism, automation causes people to lose their jobs and thus their livelihoods, and under socialism, automation decreases the amount of work humans must do and instead leaves them able to explore other hobbies that are not tied to their livelihoods.
There are certainly actual applications of AI art technology that are interesting and/or could be useful, and I think turning it into just a question of “AI art good/bad” is not a particularly insightful question and one that does not really get to the root of the problems with AI art.
Yes of course, in socialism art was heavily supported by state - in such situation AI wouldn’t be problematic at all, it would be just making art more accessible to masses who lack talent, persistence and free time for it.
Actually, it will do exactly the same in capitalism, most probably even more since capitalism is gating art anyway, but also with more casualties along the way.