Thousands of musicians, composers, actors and writers from all creative industries, including ABBA's Björn Ulvaeus, all five members of Radiohead and The Cure's Robert Smith, have signed a statement against AI companies and developers using their work without permission to train. AI systems.
Signatories also include all three major record labels — Universal Music Group, Sony Music Entertainment and Warner Music Group — as well as a wide range of music trade organizations representing labels, publishers and creators from the US, Canada, Australia, France , Germany, Spain, Austria, Mexico, United Kingdom, Ireland, Sweden and Brazil.
“The unlicensed use of creative works to train genetic artificial intelligence is a significant, unfair threat to the livelihoods of the people behind those works and should not be allowed,” the one-sentence statement published on aitrainingstatement.org.
Within hours of going live on Tuesday (October 22), the statement had been signed by more than 11,500 people from across the creative arts, including actors Kevin Bacon, Sean Astin and Rosario Dawson. authors James Patterson, Ian Rankin, Ann Patchett and Kate Mosse. and musical artists Billy Bragg, Max Richter and Norwegian singer-songwriter Aurora.
The global campaign was designed and organized by Ed Newton-RexBritish composer now based in the US, who has previously held several senior management roles in AI technology and music companies.
In 2010, Newton-Rex founded Jukedeck, a UK-based AI music production company that provided music for video, TV, radio, podcasts and games. It was acquired by TikTok parent company ByteDance in 2019.
After the acquisition, Newton-Rex, who is also a choral composer, went on to run ByteDance's European AI Lab before becoming head of audio at AI technology company Stability. He stepped down from that role last year in protest at the company's belief that it is acceptable to use copyrighted works without permission for “fair use” purposes without permission from rights holders.
Newton-Rex says Bulletin board that several trade groups are supporting his campaign and have helped gather signatures, but have not provided funding for the initiative.
The statement comes amid growing concern from creators and rights holders about how their works are being exploited by artificial intelligence developers for productive training purposes — and how to curb those tech companies.
Earlier this year, the three major record labels filed lawsuits against music artificial intelligence companies Suno and Udio alleging widespread infringement of copyrighted recordings “on an almost unimaginable scale.”
In the UK, the government is soon to launch a consultation on how to regulate AI technology and is understood to be exploring a plan that would allow AI companies to legally remove copyrighted content from artists and rights holders, except if “opted out”.
Creator groups say any “opt-out” solution would be extremely damaging to the music business and would prefer an “opt in” system that gives rights holders the ability to approve the use of their works by AI companies.
Meanwhile, tech giants Google and Microsoft are calling on the British government to relax the country's copyright laws for artificial intelligence companies and introduce an exemption for text and data mining of copyrighted works, including music. for commercial purposes. One such case was raised by the previous Conservative government in 2022, but was abandoned a year later after heavy criticism from musicians and creators.
“Intellectual property rights serve to preserve the value of human creativity while promoting value to the wider music and creative industries,” he said. Sophie Joneschief strategist at UK label trade body BPI, one of the organizations backing Newton-Rex, in a statement. “If the UK is to remain a global creative force in an increasingly competitive world,” he continued, “the government must ensure that it is respected and enforced.”
These views were echoed by the Association of Independent Musicians (AIM), which has also signed the statement.
“To achieve the benefits of AI for creativity, we urge policymakers not to overlook the need for strong copyright protection,” said AIM's interim chief executive Gee Davy in a statement on Tuesday (October 22). He added that it was “vital” that policymakers protect artists and rights holders “to ensure a healthy future for those who create, invest in and distribute music across genres and across the UK's communities, regions and nations”. .
Tuesday's statement is just the latest debacle in the battle between AI companies and rights holders. In May, Sony Music released a statement warning more than 700 AI companies not to delete the company's copyrighted data, while Warner Music released a similar statement in July. That same month in the US Senate, a bill called the No FAKES Act, which aims to protect creators from deep AI fakes, was introduced by a bipartisan group of senators.
from our partners at https://www.billboard.com/pro/labels-artists-sign-petition-opposing-ai-training-creative-works/
