An AI-generated song called “Heart On My Sleeve” featuring the voices of Drake and The Weeknd has garnered 250,000 Spotify streams and 10 million TikTok views, prompting concerns about the legality and ethics of using artists’ content without their consent.
According to American technology magazine TechCrunch, Drake recently commented on AI-generated music that uses his voice, calling it the “final straw AI.” UMG, which represents artists like Eminem and Jay-Z, has issued copyright strikes against AI-generated YouTube videos featuring their music.
Copyright laws around the use of AI are murky, though. Transformative parody is generally allowed, but there are no specific guidelines on generative AI. Interpretation of these laws is subjective and precedent-setting case law is scarce.
UMG has asked Spotify to prevent AI companies from using its music to train their models, citing a moral and commercial responsibility to its artists.
Once AI-generated content is up, it’s hard to remove. A project called Spawning AI helps artist to search for their work to see if it’s being used in an AI training set without their consent, but removing intellectual property from AI models is difficult.
It remains to be seen how artists, platforms and lawmakers will navigate the ethical and legal complexities of AI-generated content in the future.