There was a couple years there where I used to stand around in my living room with a plastic guitar strapped to my chest as I flicked a control bar with my right hand and maneuvered my left across a series of colored buttons. I was pretending to play guitar.
I have mentioned here before how much I enjoyed Guitar Hero.
On Medium.
Like so much of my video game experience, I don't feel like I need to push myself needlessly to extremes. This was also the case with my masquerade as a guitar hero. Every so often a guest would appear in our living room and ask if they could dial up the difficulty. "Go right ahead," was my response, and I was frequently amazed by their prowess manipulating a toy guitar and following those rainbow dots that came streaming across the screen. On all those occasions, I never met a single "real" guitar player. Friends who played "real" guitar scoffed at the charade I had made my avocation.
It was all a vast conspiracy created to get pikers such as myself the vague feeling of playing loud music, becoming a facsimile of a rock star in the comfort and privacy of my own home. Wish fulfillment in the most clunky possible way.
Which is pretty much how I feel about AI. Like going to an improv show and having the performers ask, "Okay, give us a situation." Then, "Alright, give us a couple characters." Finally, "Now give us a bunch of funny things to say and do."
Creating amusing videos to fill up your stream? Memes that you were too lazy to create yourself? How about give that bit of imagination you have an extra creative shove? No matter that the end product is the result of every funny bit created before it, but we'll just call that homage.
Not theft.
My wife and I will soon be marketing our own version called "Novel Hero." Right from that same living room where you once pretended to play guitar, you too can be a "novelist." Don't have the time or energy to push yourself to near madness looking for that perfect sentence? Don't worry. Artificial Intelligence has your back. Heck, half an idea is better than no idea at all. And if you're more inclined to the visual arts, coming next fall, "Paint Hero." You don't have to be a Picasso, especially since we've already got all his best bits right here in a box.
On Medium.