<story><title>4.2 Gigabytes, Or: How to Draw Anything</title><url>https://andys.page/posts/how-to-draw/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>jedberg</author><text>It&amp;#x27;s interesting that you basically just made Andrew Yang&amp;#x27;s argument for Universal Basic Income -- that we need to redistribute the wealth of automation to all of society.&lt;p&gt;This is the perfect example -- with a UBI the apprentice no longer needs to get paid to learn.  They can live off of the UBI while learning, until they are good enough to charge for their services.</text></item><item><author>VoodooJuJu</author><text>I think that&amp;#x27;s a good way to put it, but there&amp;#x27;s still a problem.&lt;p&gt;The path of a digital artist is long and arduous. For a time on this path, the artist may be considered mediocre, or to put it better, they are an &lt;i&gt;apprentice&lt;/i&gt;.&lt;p&gt;Just as in other physical trades, an apprentice who is mediocre at their craft can still practice aspects of that craft well enough to be useful and earn some money. It is also through practice that the apprentice improves their skills. In this way, the apprentice is financially supported and even incentivized to improve at their trade, until one day they become truly good at it.&lt;p&gt;So what things like DALL-E and Github Co-Pilot and your clip art package do is displace the apprentice. With no path of mediocrity for the apprentice to walk, to earn a stipend for training, how then can they receive the financial support necessary to train until they&amp;#x27;re a master? They would need to already be independently wealthy or receive financial assistance.&lt;p&gt;In order to train more master artists and programmers, we would need to provide them with financial support while they train without us receiving anything useful in return.</text></item><item><author>jedberg</author><text>Back in the 90s I bought a book that came with some floppy disks.  The book was about 500 pages of clip art, and the disks were the actual images.  At the time, people said such things would put graphic artists out of business.&lt;p&gt;What actually happened is that it put mediocre graphic artists out of business and highlighted the difference between one that was mediocre and one that was good.&lt;p&gt;I feel like this will happen again here with digital artists.  The mediocre ones will be indistinguishable from AI, but the good ones will still stand out.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>spywaregorilla</author><text>UBI is impossible to work for two reasons:&lt;p&gt;1) We need people to do low level jobs. So if UBI exists, wages will need to rise until people are willing to do them. This will happen along with price raises until an equilibrium is found where poor people need to work in order to survive. No need for narratives about landlords raising rent, though it is possible. The poor people aren&amp;#x27;t in an overall worse position here though, because although they&amp;#x27;re still earning just enough to live, a portion of that minimum is now guaranteed. However:&lt;p&gt;2) By raising your domestic (or local) wages&amp;#x2F;prices, you&amp;#x27;ve just given yourself an absolute disadvantage against every other economic entity in the world. Anything that is outsourceable is now more appealing to outsource than before. This removes jobs and puts downwards pressure on wages.&lt;p&gt;If everyone just &amp;quot;lives off UBI while learning&amp;quot; society won&amp;#x27;t function because the jobs they do are important.</text></comment>
<story><title>4.2 Gigabytes, Or: How to Draw Anything</title><url>https://andys.page/posts/how-to-draw/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>jedberg</author><text>It&amp;#x27;s interesting that you basically just made Andrew Yang&amp;#x27;s argument for Universal Basic Income -- that we need to redistribute the wealth of automation to all of society.&lt;p&gt;This is the perfect example -- with a UBI the apprentice no longer needs to get paid to learn.  They can live off of the UBI while learning, until they are good enough to charge for their services.</text></item><item><author>VoodooJuJu</author><text>I think that&amp;#x27;s a good way to put it, but there&amp;#x27;s still a problem.&lt;p&gt;The path of a digital artist is long and arduous. For a time on this path, the artist may be considered mediocre, or to put it better, they are an &lt;i&gt;apprentice&lt;/i&gt;.&lt;p&gt;Just as in other physical trades, an apprentice who is mediocre at their craft can still practice aspects of that craft well enough to be useful and earn some money. It is also through practice that the apprentice improves their skills. In this way, the apprentice is financially supported and even incentivized to improve at their trade, until one day they become truly good at it.&lt;p&gt;So what things like DALL-E and Github Co-Pilot and your clip art package do is displace the apprentice. With no path of mediocrity for the apprentice to walk, to earn a stipend for training, how then can they receive the financial support necessary to train until they&amp;#x27;re a master? They would need to already be independently wealthy or receive financial assistance.&lt;p&gt;In order to train more master artists and programmers, we would need to provide them with financial support while they train without us receiving anything useful in return.</text></item><item><author>jedberg</author><text>Back in the 90s I bought a book that came with some floppy disks.  The book was about 500 pages of clip art, and the disks were the actual images.  At the time, people said such things would put graphic artists out of business.&lt;p&gt;What actually happened is that it put mediocre graphic artists out of business and highlighted the difference between one that was mediocre and one that was good.&lt;p&gt;I feel like this will happen again here with digital artists.  The mediocre ones will be indistinguishable from AI, but the good ones will still stand out.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>Dalewyn</author><text>I&amp;#x27;m going to be level with you: I don&amp;#x27;t want to pay for someone&amp;#x27;s food and board so they can draw lines on paper (which won&amp;#x27;t sell) all day. Likewise, I don&amp;#x27;t expect anyone to pay for my food and board so I can do fuck all either.&lt;p&gt;If you want a living, earn it. If you want wealth, earn it. Might not happen with your favorite school of craft, but the vast majority of people don&amp;#x27;t&amp;#x2F;can&amp;#x27;t make money doing something they are passionate about.</text></comment>