When it comes to AI slop, the hits just keep coming, and Napster (yes, that Napster) is responsible for the latest banger. Much to my chagrin, everyone over 30’s favorite music piracy site is back from the dead zombie-style, and this time it’s billing itself as a platform where people (not people I care to know) can go and create AI music slop together.
Here’s what the new CEO, some guy named John Acunto, has to say about all that:
“Napster was born to break boundaries, and we’re doing it again. We see this as a declaration that the age of passive consumption is over. Fans aren’t here to be fed a playlist. They’re here to co-create, to fuse their identity with AI artists in real time, and to shape the soundtrack of a new era.”
Sure, whatever you say, John. Because if there’s one thing people hate, it’s listening to music. So passé. You can go ahead and delete Spotify or Apple Music, everyone. Thanks to zombie Napster, you’re co-creators now, not just a sheep who merely (scoffs) listens to music.
There’s, regrettably, a lot to unpack in the new direction for Napster, but the gist of it is that you can download an app (or use Napster on the web) to dive in and start generating music as you would on similar music slop apps like Suno. If music isn’t your thing, then you can also generate podcasts, which is an even more depressing thought somehow.
Napster doesn’t just want you to listen to AI slop on its platform, though; as we already established, it envisions you as a collaborator, meaning you’ll have the option to interact with its slop-generating chatbots. Naturally, I gave that harrowing idea a whirl, so you don’t have to. I had the pleasure of interacting with slop specialist “Nia Jenkins,” whom I prompted to make “AI slopo,” which is a typo of “AI slop” that I didn’t bother to fix.
After a few minutes of “thinking,” Nia generated me a song about AI slop, which was pretty meta if I do say so myself, and it sounded, well, a lot like AI slop with a hip-hop/R&B styling. I also made the mistake of allowing microphone access, which lets you speak to the chatbot and prompt it with words out of your mouth. If you’ve ever had a conversation with ChatGPT, it’s the same vibe. Do I regret giving Napster access to my microphone? Yes. There’s no second leg to that statement. I just regret it.
The whole thing is as deflating as you’d expect. You type some words, and Napster’s chatbot churns out some sounds that I’m told are meant to be music. To no one’s surprise, Napster doesn’t give any insight into what data its chatbot is trained on, but if I had to guess, it’d be copyrighted music. In that way, the new Napster embodies the same spirit as the old Napster, which at its core was all about stealing. Unfortunately, this stealing just isn’t as fun as the old stealing. I mean, at least the other Napster pissed Metallica off.
If I’m being honest, the whole thing just feels very hollow, but I’m not sure what one would expect from a platform that is predicated on taking the creativity, skill, and soul out of one of the greatest artistic mediums ever to grace humankind. I mean, just look at this official zombie Napster picture (which I am going to assume is AI-generated). The AI image generator literally tried and failed to steal an iconic Nirvana shirt, folks; you can’t make this stuff up.
I don’t know, man, maybe I’m just not reading the room here. Maybe we all just hate making music now, and zombie Napster is the next big thing. Maybe John whatshisface is on the precipice of laughing his ass all the way to the AI-generated bank. Or maybe zombie Napster is destined to wind up the same way as the original Napster—as a footnote in the long and sordid history of music versus technology. Just a much, much, much smaller one.
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