Text | Music Herald, Author | Li Qinyu, Editor | Fan Zhihui On May 16, Sony Music issued a statement on its official website, announcing that Sony Music would withdraw from AI training and prohibited any company from conducting AI training without authorization. Train AI models w

text | Music Herald, author | Li Qinyu, editor | Fan Zhihui

According to BBC news, Sony Music Group has sent warning letters to about 700 AI companies and streaming media platforms. In the letter, it stated that Sony Music recognized the "tremendous potential and advancement" of artificial intelligence. However, the unauthorized use of Sony Music’s content in the training, development or commercialization of artificial intelligence systems deprives it of control and benefits from the use of the content.

Among them, Sony Music Group asked each recipient to provide details of the songs it used to train the artificial intelligence system, as well as how to access these songs, ask for the number of copies of the songs, etc.

Although Sony Music Group did not clearly state which 700 companies it sent this letter to, and the full version of the letter has not been made public, according to people familiar with the matter, they include many large companies such as OpenAI, Microsoft, and Google.

According to foreign media reports, in addition to artificial intelligence developers, SMG also sent separate letters to Apple and Spotify, requiring streaming media platforms to take best measures to protect artists and songwriters and circumvent the illegal activities of unauthorized AI companies. Train the model and ask them to update their terms of service to prohibit mining and scraping of their content.

To put it simply, this letter is a warning to about 700 AI companies and streaming media platforms, either to admit that unauthorized infringement has occurred, or to provide detailed information on artificial intelligence training if they do not admit it.

Sony Music took the lead in "exiting the group chat"

The reason why Sony Music Group did this was not only its market position as one of the three major record labels, but also the increasingly standardized laws and regulations that provided the confidence.

In March this year, the European Union passed the Artificial Intelligence Act, which requires providers of general artificial intelligence models to disclose "sufficiently detailed" summaries of the content used to train these models. According to a principle introduced by the Artificial Intelligence Bill from the European Union's 2019 Copyright Directive, if the copyright owner chooses to opt out, artificial intelligence developers must obtain an authorization for the copyrighted material used.

Although the provision met with opposition from the industry at the time, the National Music Rights Agents Association (nmpa) stated in a 2023 submission to the U.S. Copyright Office: “The opt-out system shifts the burden of obtaining licenses to users, away from Fundamentally destroying copyright protection.”

It is understood that Sony Music Group is also the only company among the three major record companies that has not participated in the previous new YouTube “dream track” function, but the company has not completely shunned artificial intelligence.

Last summer, after Sony Music hired its first executive vice president of artificial intelligence, Geoff Taylor, in November it launched the AI ​​project "metallic spheres in color" of the electronic band the Orb and the veteran band Pink Floyd, inviting fans to re-create the music through the use of AI tools. Participated in the creation of the music and cover of the new album.

At the Artificial Intelligence Forum held by the U.S. Senate in November last year, Dennis Kooker, President of Sony Music U.S. Sales, also stated the large music company’s position on artificial intelligence and copyright law in his speech.

dennis Kooker has publicly discussed Sony Music's efforts to remove unauthorized AI content from its online platform, including the nearly 10,000 separate takedowns the company has announced. In addition, dennis kooker also made it clear that he opposed Google artificial intelligence developers' "use of copyrighted materials to train artificial intelligence models, which should fall within the scope of fair use exemptions under copyright law."

dennis kooker believes that even if the material receives copyright protection, if If AI companies are allowed to use it at will, it means that "certain companies can appropriate all the value generated by the creative department without permission and build huge businesses based on it without paying any money to the relevant creators. cost."

It can be seen that Sony Music's strategy in the field of artificial intelligence is more inclined to develop tools that can enhance creativity and protect content, rather than participating in experiments that may involve greater copyright and moral risks. Through this survey of about 700 AI The letter from the company and the streaming media platform also reflects Sony Music’s determination to promote a win-win situation for copyright owners, artists and AI technology parties.

ai music copyright disputes have never stopped.

In recent years, AI technology has become increasingly popular both at home and abroad. Applications in the music industry have long been common.

According to a survey of 1,500 music producers by bpb (Music Production Forum) last year, about 36.8% of producers have used AI tools in the music production process, and 30.1% of them have used AI tools in the music production process. % of producers plan to try using AI tools. According to MBW, 170 million songs will be created using artificial intelligence in 2023 alone and uploaded to music streaming platforms such as Apple Music, Spotify and Amazon Music

regardless of foreign countries. AI music tools such as Suno, Aiva, and Boomy, as well as domestic AI music tools such as tme studio and xstudio, all provide diverse functions in songwriting, mixing, and music generation.

The resulting copyright disputes have arisen. And lawsuits are also increasing. According to information from overseas digital media platform sustainable tech partner, has rough statistics that there have been 40 disputes related to AI music since 2023, including 8 lawsuits involving

. In April this year, the Artist Copyright Alliance and About 200 artists, including Billie Eilish, Nicki Minaj, and Katy Perry, jointly issued an open letter calling on digital music developers to "stop using artificial intelligence to infringe and demean the rights of human artists."

Not long ago, TikTok and Universal Music Group jointly announced. , the two parties reached a new copyright licensing agreement. One of the most important agreements is that the two parties promise to "work together to ensure that the development of artificial intelligence in the entire music industry will protect human art, and the resulting economic benefits will flow to those artists." and songwriters. "

is also in an embarrassing situation, as well as openai.

Since the launch of the popular text-to-video generation model sora in March last year, the company's chief technology officer mira murati was vague and unable to make it clear in an interview with the Wall Street Journal Explain the source of sora's training data.

In May of this year, according to CNBC, Google CEO Sundar Pichai said: If it is determined that Microsoft-backed OpenAI relies on YouTube content to train artificial intelligence models that can generate videos, Google will take legal measures Solve this problem.

Since the birth of aigc technology, the copyright disputes over its training content have never subsided. Nowadays, it has really affected the interests of creative industry giants. Sony Music’s official warning this time has also contributed to this aigc. The copyright defense war has become more intense. The related tools provided by

ai for artistic creation are no longer just a threat to creators and copyright owners. This is not like the evolution of painters putting down their brushes and picking up their hand-drawn tablets, but more like an evolution of the future of the industry. Subversion, and for this reason, the intervention of major companies will also force the rapid iteration and improvement of relevant laws and regulations.

From legislation to technology, how to safeguard the value of human art?

From December 8 last year, the European Parliament and EU member states The three parties reached an agreement with the European Commission on the Artificial Intelligence Act. On March 13 this year, the European Parliament passed the Artificial Intelligence Act with 523 votes in favor, 46 votes against, and 49 abstentions.

This bill is the first in the world. Comprehensive legislation targeting the widespread use of artificial intelligence aims to ensure that artificial intelligence systems deployed and used in the EU market are safe and consistent with fundamental rights and EU values. The general artificial intelligence model that has had a significant impact on society has proposed new governance requirements and established a dedicated artificial intelligence office to oversee and enforce these regulations.

On the other hand, the state of Tennessee in the United States also recently passed the "Securing Portrait Voice and Image". Security (ELVIS) Act" to protect the entertainment industry from the abuse of artificial intelligence.Different from the Artificial Intelligence Act, this new bill mainly focuses on protecting personal voices and images from unauthorized use by artificial intelligence. The unauthorized use of personal voices or images can be brought through civil lawsuits. Hold accountable.

On a technical level, in May this year, French audio technology company ircam amplify launched a new tool, ai-generate detector, designed to identify music created using artificial intelligence. It can scan up to 5,000 music tracks in one minute, accurately The rate is as high as 98.5%. Nathalie Birocheau, CEO of

ircam Amplify, said: "Our AI-generated detector is a game changer. It will provide transparency where there is opacity, giving users a strategic advantage and helping them make informed decisions about their music content." The promulgation and enforcement of

ai tools, anti-AI tools, and related laws are starting a protracted battle.

As a practitioner in the industry, perhaps we can only look at it with the mentality of learning from the foreigners to learn from the foreigners in order to defeat the foreigners. On the one hand, we should actively embrace the changes in the industry and try and apply more AI tools to prevent being eliminated. On the other hand, we should always pay attention to the changes in the wind direction and protect the industry. So that your current rights and interests are not infringed upon.

Conclusion

Science fiction movies are becoming reality.

When humans use tools to draw a clear line between themselves and all things, they gradually bring a sense of God into the rapid development of creation.

Whether it is an intelligent robot or artificial intelligence technology, its "artificial" character is marked by the imprint of "human". The birth of this kind of silicon-based life gave humans a sense of God’s creation of humans, and its creators also demonstrated humans’ dual aspirations and worries about the development of science and technology in its development - on the one hand, films such as "s1m0ne" and "Artificial Intelligence" The beautiful vision of "Intelligence" that is human-centered and high-tech will always serve every human being equally. On the one hand, as worried by "The Matrix" and "Westworld", it is worried that its highly developed wisdom will eventually subvert human society. pose an inevitable threat.

However, the future that was still discussed in science fiction works in the past few decades has quietly arrived, and artificial intelligence has rudely broken into our daily lives. The impact of technology on dimensionality reduction in traditional industries has finally reached the field of human art.

This is contrary to the previous expectations of optimists for artificial intelligence to handle tedious and repetitive daily tasks and leave creativity to humans. What is even more worrying is that it will still take a long time for laws and regulations and other institutional levels to be reasonably regulated.

How to minimize the negative impact of artificial intelligence technology and prevent the music industry from becoming a primitive jungle of chaos and disorder, where the weak and the strong prey on each other, will become an inevitable industry topic in the future.

After all, in the Bible, even if God created humans and put them in the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve could not escape the temptation of the snake, which symbolizes wisdom, and rebelled by eating the forbidden fruit.