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Do You Think There Should be Rules for How Much AI Should be Allowed in Songs on This Forum

Reid Rosefelt

Reid Rosefelt

Well-known member
There's a thought-provoking thread on this forum about AI and songs. It started out being about Synthesizer V, but the focus broadened into larger issues of AI and songwriting. What is an AI song? If somebody types in a prompt on Suno or Udio and clicks generate, I think we can all agree that the result is an AI song. But if you use an AI software tool to make it, is it "AI"? It gets complicated, and everybody has an opinion.

Brice J. Bentley

Thread 'Can a human-created song that uses Synthesizer V as a vocalist be pitched as "AI-free?"'

So many songs today are being written and composed by AI. AI-generated music has become so prolific that it's no surprise some writers and producers are feeling a need to signal that they're creating music without it. On VI-Control, there's a spirited debate raging on about whether or not someone can pitch their music as "AI-free" if it was 100% written, composed, and arranged by humans, but the vocals were performed by Synthesizer V, an AI-driven vocal software program.

Even though Synthesizer V is an AI-driven program, it cannot create anything on its own. It operates the same way as a...
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There's probably ten thousand people or more writing songs on Suno or Udio than there are members of this forum. That's the world today and it's going more and more in that direction.

Should this forum be dedicated to non-AI songs? An oasis for songwriting by humans? I'd like that, but I don't know exactly what definition to use. I use Synth V to write my songs, but hire people to sing them. There are already AI plugins and we will find AI features in many DAWs.

I think there should be a clear policy for what kind of songs belong in the main part of this forum. I also think there should be a subforum that welcomes AI songs of all kinds.

Do you think there should be a policy? What would it be? What do you think, @Mike Greene?

I can say that there is no policy at another songwriter forum, and some long-time members are leaving.
 
I think [I hope] the name of the forum alone should be enough to keep the imposters out. It would take a lot of guts for someone to come into "Songwriter and Producer" and post something they had AI create for them.

If the forum had a separate section just for AI songs, I think it would lead to two possible outcomes:

1. The AI section would die a quick death because no one would go there.​
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2. Since Suno is turning tens of thousands of people into self-proclaimed music producers, the AI section could become a haven for them and this forum would become overrun with AI music, which would drive me and the rest of the forum's pioneer members out.​

A "human created music only" policy might be a good business decision though, because it could help lure in songwriters and producers who were driven out of other forums, making this a true oasis.
 
This forum is called "Songwriter and Producer".

Songwriting includes:
  • lyrics
  • chords
  • melody
  • arrangement
Producing includes:
  • instrument choices
  • recording (if applicable)
  • mixing
  • mastering
(depending on the definition, the above may vary slightly. But I think for modern non-classical music it's a good place to start)

Perhaps we could start a poll to find out how many tasks from the two areas mentioned above must not need to be AI-based, to give us a starting point.
At least for posts that contain songs.

There should be no restrictions on posts without audio content, because if someone needs help with e.g. song lyrics, it shouldn't matter what they do or don't do with them.

Your thoughts?
 
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I'm fine if someone uses ChatGPT to help with lyrics, uses Scaler to suggest chord progressions, uses a Reason Player device to come up with melodic ideas, uses EZbass to generate bass lines, uses drum loops for drum parts, uses Synth V to express a vocal performance, uses ReSing or VoiceAI to revoice a vocal, mixes and masters with iZotope or Sonible smart plugins, etc. To me, these types of tools fall under the category of innovative time-saving utilities available to modern songwriters and producers.

The only AI-related objection I have, is to full prompt-generated songs, such as those from Udio and Suno. Mostly because I find them boring, unremarkable, and they don't convey anything about the true musical artistry of the person who prompted/posted the song. At best, they're simply a lesson in how to write a prompt, and nothing more. They have nothing at all to do with songwriting or production.

One of the libraries I write for, prominently displays the following slogan on their website: "Human-created, Human-curated". I think a similar approach on this site would suffice. A simple tag line that proclaims this is a place for human-created songs.

At the end of the day, it's all on the honor system anyway - I mean anyone can prompt a song and post it here saying they wrote and recorded it. So I don't think there's any point in getting overly granular, splitting hairs over which type of AI is acceptable or not. Simply making it clear this is a place for human-created content should be all that's needed, IMHO.
 
My general philosophy is it's best not to make rules until a problem actually arises. Writing rules is really hard, because for almost any rule, there will be exceptions. For example, a tempting rule might be that only legitimate music can be posted. Yet we allow polka here! (I kid, I kid!)

Everybody already knows what's cool and what isn't, so by not having rules, we have more flexibility. We can always make rules later, if an actual problem presents itself.

Let's say, for instance, we had a rule stating AI-created songs are not allowed. Sounds reasonable, since we certainly don't want this forum devolving into that.

But there was a thread recently on VI-C where a new member posted what seems to be an AI video with AI score, and that person asked for specific advice on changes for the score.

Now, we definitely don't want VI-C to get deluged with "compositions" like that, so my first thought was to delete the thread. The person seemed very sincere, though, and a few of us were interested in hearing more from this person about their thought process. We were hoping to learn is there satisfaction from that, etc.

So while we would normally just delete a "Member Composition" that was just a lazy posting (I should add that I don't think that's actually happened yet), this one seemed sincere, and I felt there could be something to be learned from it.

Whether that was the right move or not, I don't know, but my point is that it's easy enough to just handle things as they come.
 
The people who use AI to do all the work are likely to self-select themselves out of the forum, anyway.

Because if you use Suno (or some similar tool) to do all the work, what's there to discuss?

But as Mike suggested, if there is something to discuss, let's not preclude that.
 
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