The pianist playing in a restaurant was optimized by the player piano (which would only play if you put a nickel in) back in the late 1800s. Muzak put the final nail in that coffin in 1954.

The player piano technology comes from the barrel organ, which seems to have been on the first pipe organs.

I think if ones perspective of manual art changes, so does that of AI art, sorta like shifting priorities in life. Some priorities are higher than others. And past a certain point, AI art becomes a tempting option beneath a certain motivation level.

If for example you find manual art more fun to practice than AI art, you'd be less inclined to give AI companies money to generate art, since you could perhaps spend hours and hours practicing and have fun.

And of course if you don't find manual art enjoyable, but still don't want to give up on the "art" idea entirely, AI art crosses the threshold into enjoyability, so the end product is at least in front of your eyes.

As for how to learn how to make one type of art more fun than the other, if ones preferences are set in stone, it's pretty tough. The AI/non-art-inclined crowd might invert your quote so the laundry and dishes get prioritized, because different people have different priorities.

I agree, but live performance in the age of recording is already a luxury good, and it is unlikely an AI would replace live performance any more than a player piano or CD player would (or has.)

I can't see how in a world full of recordings how in person, live performance art could get anything but vastly more valuable.

I saw a stage performance of Clue a few weeks ago. It was lovely. Nothing was AI generated, and couldn't be, because it was people physically making art live. How nice.

I will continue to pay for those experiences and to prioritize them over recorded ones.

No doubt it'll be more valuable but the number of opportunities (to watch and play at those) will decrease globally.

People want robots do (low-value && computationally intensive) tasks - I think it's fair and okay by now to say unfolding wet clumps came out of a washing machine belongs to a class of tasks that are computationally intensive for human brains.

Your comment reminded me of a scene from the movie "El Mariachi". In it, the title character walks into a bar looking for a job as a Mariachi, and is faced with the bar owner telling him something like "Why do I need a Mariachi when I can have a full band?", then pointing to a guy resting in the corner next to an organ (an "electronic organ", of the family type, as opposed to, you know, a hammond or something like that). The resting guy presses the "demo" button and the organ plays Mariachi music on its own ...

I share your pessimism partially, but I also wonder: if the system keeps optimizing for profit, at some point there just won't be enough people in the world to sell products and services to. I don't know what the answer is.

Edit: typo

The only real answer here.