Many other people benefit from the creativity of humans who can create and play music, but when computers start making music that humans cannot, the game of musical chairs could find the RIAA odd man out, according to ars technica.

The first step in the process appears to be well underway. "... a significant advancement has taken place in the field of computer music with the development of software that can not only transcribe polyphonic music in real time, but can also play back complex harmonies alongside human performers. For instance, at the annual Music Information Retrieval Exchange (MIREX) competition, Christopher Raphael of Indiana University demonstrated a system that can understand live music well enough to accompany a musician," Jeremy Reimer reported.

The actions of a highly sophisticated program that can listen to, pick up on the rhythms of human players, and synthesize an accompaniment may be just the the first step for computers that will someday independently generate music.

"Technology is changing our sense of what music can be," Mr. Raphael said. "The effect is profound."

"Computer performers could handle new types of music with many more notes played at once than humans are capable of handling," Mr. Reimer said. "Disc Jockeys could have many more options for creating unique performances. And software could make learning an instrument faster and more enjoyable, as students could practice with a "real" orchestra again." All these technologies will fit together in a new realm of computer music that could ultimately change the rules of the music business.

If the day comes when all the really great music worth listening to is created by computer software available to everyone, an extreme extension of Apple’s Garage Band, technology will once again have changed the rules so radically that the days of the RIAA squabbling with and suing its customers will seem like ancient history.