[orthecreedence]

Right, this will probably end up being like how autotune was for singers.

I don't really want "anyone" to make music. I want people who are good at making music to make music. Yeah we should remove barriers for those people, but honestly nothing beats practice and dedication. Tech seems more and more focused on regurgitation instead of creation.

[recursive]

Autotune sounds different than non-autotune regardless of whether it's used by a good or bad singer. As a result, it can be used for creative purposes, even by good singers.

Drum machines sounds different from kits, which doesn't mean that drum machines are an inferior version of drum kits. They are different, and there's room for both.

Maybe you will never like any song with autotune in it. That's fine. But the idea of objectively "good at making music" leads to some nonsense. There's no accounting for taste.

In my opinion, the more music made, the better. There's something for everyone.

[spacechild1]

> Yeah we should remove barriers for those people

The thing is, we have already removed all of the financial/logistic barriers. Anyone who owns a laptop can setup their own little home studio with a mic + audio interface + pair of speakers for under 200 bucks. That's how I started as a kid. But as you say, you still need practice and dedication (and some talent). If you get rid of that, you essentially get rid of art.

That being said, I do remember Magix Music Maker and Acid Music from the early 2000s where you could easily create your own songs by drag&dropping loops on a timeline. Actually, that's what got me into music production as a kid. I think this kind of software can be a great starting point. The problem with Suno and Udio, IMO, is that the interface is too basic and offers very little control over the actual music.

Now, the actual problem is that people will abuse these programs to spam established distribution channels with low effort AI garbage on a massive scale. We already see this happening in other domains (digital visual art, books).

Of course, you can't expect tech companies to consider the broad effects of their products on society...