Alexandra Zerner

The rise of generative AI has brought about a paradigm shift, leaving both artists and music fans scrambling to differentiate between what is real and what is artificial.

Gone are the days when online sleuths were concerned about whether someone was “fake” playing or using a backing track. Now, it’s all about whether the guitarist on screen is even human or just a figment of machine learning and algorithms.

But even the machines have to learn from real players, as guitarist, songwriter, and social media influencer Sophie Burrell found out the hard way.

“I was scrolling on TikTok and got recommended a video of a ‘girl’ playing guitar,” Burrell tells Guitar World.

“It was identical to my setup. Same camera angle, same room, same guitar, same movements. It took me less than a second to realize it was literally my video, except I’d been replaced by an AI-generated character.”

It’s been 6 months of living on Airbnb’s across 4 countries, 11 cities so far… A true odyssey. I have collected a lot of data from every place that I have spent some time so I can build a huge spreadsheet to track air pollution, water pollution, types of industry in proximity, wind directions, symptoms, temperature, humidity, and whatnot, to be able to make an educated guess for the next city in line.

Like a canary in a coal mine, my body reacts to everything much more than the average person, which makes it so difficult to find a place which doesn’t harm me. And even when I find such, it has to fulfil other criteria as well, as one of the main ones is being affordable for me.

And now, when yet another city’s water caused my throat and skin to burn, I have to pack my stuff and get on the train again… But as you can imagine, holiday season is starting, therefore Airbnb prices go wildly up so it becomes even more difficult to pay for accomodation and the perspective to end up on the streets is approaching again with frightening realism.

Algorithms made me invisible on YouTube so the two things which make it possible for me to earn a living - teaching guitar and providing exclusive content for my website members - got heavily compromised. That said, I would like to appeal to you once more to help me sustain my life somehow by sharing this and supporting my existence by:
- buying my music at https://alexandrazerner.com/discography
- pre-ordering my new album at https://alexandrazerner.com/new-album
- getting guitar lessons with me at http://www.alexandrazerner.com/online-guitar-lessons/
- donating at https://alexandrazerner.com/donate
Thank you in advance!