Only recently became aware of this. Someone had made an amp sim of an amp that I was interested in, had only one example. Sounded...not terrible but not like the gear. So I asked the developer some questions, and became suspicious when they couldn't answer basic questions about the gear they were supposedly modelling; questions about the topology, the on-board effects in the amp. Did some digging and found the creator posting in groups for vibe coding. When I asked them about it I got response that seemed like they had AI help them write it.

There are signs, as has been noted above in this thread the manual is a good place to start. These people do not code their own plugins and as such have little understanding as to how they work, and it shows with how vague they are about it. If the plugin is based on hardware, a lack of knowledge regarding the nuances of the hardware is an obvious tell. The developer's pedigree is also an easy sign; if they have been making plugins for years now then they have the knowledge base to actually code, if they have been involved in the hardware or production world for a while and are designing plugins with a clear concept or purpose then it's probably a good sign. Not definitive, but a good sign.

And of course don't buy any stuff that you can't demo first.

 

Which amp sim is this? I probably used it and thought it was amazing.

 

I've noticed that couple of months ago. All those Carve Audios, Canvas Audios, F that A.s Audios bunch of nonsense AI slop plugins. I honestly stopped to care when I see another compressor or EQ, I don't even try them anymore. And the worse part, it's just a beginning. They prey on consumer's ignorance, to me it is even worse than selling warez, because warez sites might have some old-n-gold plugins you can't find anywhere else, but this... this is just junk.

 

I don't know if Canvas Audio is AI vibe coding slop, but I know they paid a lot of money to YouTubers to have them pretend they are excited about their plugins. Guess how many are using them in subsequent videos? Yeah, zero. But it sounds so good!

 

An orange rockerverb clone by some small developer. They didn't even bother to throw in a spring IR for the reverb tank, it's just like a standard JUCE reverb lol

 

They are, I saw their plugins on Audioloom website.

 

well, if the enduser does not hear if it good or bad, why bother are about the DSP code...

 

In most cases the cream does rise to the top. In a market dominated by finance capital, however, what we see is a deluge of mediocre products. Some start on the ground as mediocre products while others (investors) just buy companies and then pump out inferior products through their established brand. That's a lot of noise and trends to "rise" through.
Backed by capital, companies also flood media platforms with marketing and astro-turfed influencing. The product gets so much exposure, a consumer is likely to give it some attention. Very similar to radio stations playing the same singles over and over.

There's much more happening here in our system of consumption/production, reinforced by media systems and influencers, than just crappy plugins being pumped out.

Of course everything is more nuanced than this. We do have great developers creating awesome plugins but we also have seen innovative companies get swallowed up by bigger companies and are now just a shell of what they were - rushing along with the rest of the mediocre flood.

 

Just curious - How would this discussion change for you if we were to establish which brand is doing AI prompting vs which brand is incompetent / doing amateurish coding.