Here’s what the new CEO, someone named John Acunto, had to say about all this:
“Napster was born to break boundaries, and we’re doing it again. We see this as a declaration that the era of passive consumption is over. Fans aren’t here to be fed a playlist. They’re here to co-create, connect their identities with AI artists in real time, and shape the soundtrack of a new age.”
Sure, whatever you say, John. Because if there’s one thing people hate, it’s listening to music. So it passed. You can go ahead and delete all of them, including Spotify or Apple Music. Thanks to Zombie Napster, you are co-creators Now, not just a sheep that only (scoffs) Listens to music.
Sadly, there’s a lot of new direction for Napster to unpack, but the gist of it is that you can download an app (or use Napster on the web) and start generating music as you would on similar music slop apps like Listen. If music isn’t your thing, you can also produce podcasts, which is somehow an even more frustrating idea.
napster just doesn’t want you Hear However, AI is on the decline on its platform; As we’ve already established, it views you as a collaborator, meaning you’ll have the option to interact with its slop-generating chatbots. Naturally, I put that pesky thought to rest so you don’t have to. I had the pleasure of chatting with slop expert “Nia Jenkins”, who I inspired to coin “AI sloppo”, which is a typo of “AI sloppo” that I didn’t bother to correct.
After a few minutes of “thinking”, Nia composed a song for me about AI Slope, which was pretty meta if I do say so myself, and it sounded like AI Slope with a hip-hop/R&B style. I also made the mistake of allowing microphone access, which lets you talk to the chatbot and give prompts by speaking words out of your mouth. If you’ve ever interacted with ChatGPT, this is the same environment. Do I regret giving Napster access to my microphone? Yes. There is no other basis for that statement. I just regret it.
The whole thing is as disappointing as you’d expect. You type in some words, and Napster’s chatbot spits out some sounds, which I’m told are musical. To no one’s surprise, Napster doesn’t provide any information on what data its chatbot is trained on, but if I had to guess, it would be copyrighted music. In this way, the new Napster embodies the same spirit as the old Napster, which had its origins in pure piracy. Unfortunately, this heist isn’t as fun as the old heist. I mean, at least the second Napster pissed off Metallica.
The whole thing sounds pretty hollow if I’m honest, but I’m not sure what one would expect from a platform that’s dedicated to bringing out the creativity, skill and soul from one of the greatest artistic mediums ever to grace mankind. I mean, just look at this official zombie Napster picture (which I’m assuming is AI-generated). The AI image generator literally tried to steal an iconic Nirvana shirt and failed, guys; You can’t make this stuff up.
I don’t know, man, maybe I’m not reading the room here. Maybe we all hate making music now, and zombie Napster is the next big thing. John Whatshiface may be on the verge of laughing his ass off all the way to the bank with an AI-generated. Or maybe Zombie Napster is destined to end up like the original Napster – as a footnote in the long and sordid history of music versus technology. just very, very, excess The small one.
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