You’re conflating “content creators you’re aware of” and the entire collection of industries that comprise commercial art. Indeed, the search engine optimizing celebrity influencer content creation market is booming— a lot of it either being backed by legacy media, re-using other people’s content directly, or being better at marketing AI knockoffs of other people’s content than the original creators. Do you think that any of those content creators hesitate for a second to use copyright protections against someone gaining popularity using their scripts/footage/audio, etc to make the same kind of content? Beyond that, most commercial art isn’t feasible to sell in those mediums. The people benefiting from this is so infinitesimally small compared to and not representative of the many commercial art markets at large— everything from concept artists to graphic designers to dancers— that it’s entirely forgivable to exclude it from analysis altogether, let alone basing your analysis on it. You might as well deem someone with a gunshot wound perfectly healthy based entirely on their hair.

The other direct-sell platforms you referenced have already been flooded by people bulk-creating AI knock-offs. The giant slop hose has already won the race to the bottom making it nearly impossible for people that aren’t already established to get started. It’s most obvious in stock photo markets, but in music, some of the creation tools specifically advertise generating output to avoid triggering copyright scanners.

And no, you can’t just go grab a job at the big studios because a) a lot of them are using, or assuming they’ll soon be able to effectively use, the same AI tools that everyone else is based in other peoples labor and eliminating FTEs, b) since so many commercial artists have been displaced by tech companies essentially selling their work, everybody— including former freelancers and indies— is shooting for the same dwindling set of jobs, and c) nobody in those industries is leaving their jobs because they know it might be the end of their career if they do.

I don’t expect you to understand the markets outside of your area of expertise, but I would appreciate your being less patronizing while you attempt to explain my career to me.