In a panel discussion at the FICCI Frames 2024 on March 6, professionals from the music industry talked about artificial intelligence being a “great enabler”, when asked about the impact of AI on their profession. While lyricists and composers, Garima Wahal, Siddharth Singh, and Shreyas Puranik, and Abe Thomas, Chief Executive Officer, Radio Big FM discussed potentials of AI, they opined that they are not particularly worried about AI being a disruptor in the music industry as of now.
‘AI is for efficiency, not yet for imagination’
“I strongly believe AI is an enabler. In almost every step of the process in creating radio content, we use some form of AI or not, whether it is writing scripts, whether it is improving the audio quality of recording that we do for creating an advertisement. It’s about how as professionals, as talent, we can use AI as an enabler. If any repetitive job can be done, possibly more efficiently by AI. But if you want innovation, if you want new thoughts, you need human imagination,” Thomas stated, acknowledging the risks related to deepfakes that comes with the evolution of AI technology.
Adding to the experiments with AI, Puranik talked about how the industry is already using AI for routine tasks. “I was pitching for a film, and the production house wanted certain singer to sing the said song. This is a long process, which involves reaching out to the singer and then testing whether it works on the singer’s voice. With an AI tool, I merely had to sing and command it to test it in another singer’s voice. And the song was locked because that singer’s voice is already there already. He can then sing it later,” Puranik explained.
For strengthening Copyright and claims to royalty:
When asked whether Indian artists are worried about how their musical works can be used to train generative AI tools or even impact their claims to Copyright given that there is no clarity regarding how Indian laws would deal with copyright issues involving AI, Garima Wahal stated that they look for a technology that would in fact help strengthen protection for their work.
“AI entering the space of our copyright and royalty is definitely something we would highly appreciate because for us as creators, we get so engrossed in finding work, getting work, and creating that we hardly find the time. If it comes into our accounts, we take thick stock of that. But there is so much happening around the world, and music, lyrics are not something that is consumed locally, but internationally. For me to know whether one of my songs is playing in Indonesia and to be able to collect royalty for that or get my justified copyright. I think if AI comes into that, it will be magic,” she explained.
Why does it matter?
The Indian music industry professionals seem to be embracing AI, while not worrying much about the technology’s impact on employment opportunities, or even unauthorised use of their works by tech companies. Recently, AR Rahman used AI-generated voices of late singers Bamba Bakya and Shahul Hameed for a soundtrack, Thimiri Yezhudu, in an upcoming Tamil film ‘Lal Salaam’. This was made possible by a company called Timeless Voices, which trained an AI model on songs sung by the two artists. While Rahman stated that the families of the late singers had consented to the use and were compensated, the news also raised concerns about how can one be certain about the consent of an individual who is no more alive.
The discussion is pertinent in context of several ongoing legal cases filed by artists and publishers against AI companies for unauthorised usage of their work for training generative AI tools. Moreover, in April 2023, the Universal Music Group (UMG) had asked streaming services like Spotify and Apple to block AI services from using melodies and lyrics from copyrighted songs.
In 2023, when Google introduced its AI model MusicLM, which can generate music from text prompts, it invited concerns about the data being used to train the software and the copyright issues that may arise once the model is open for public use. Sandhya Surendran, tech and media lawyer, pointed out that there’s not enough visibility regarding the source and the manner in which datasets are used for machine learning purposes. The use of AI for generating music or even for creating derivative works from original music will have an impact on rights of usage, licensing arrangements, distribution on platforms, and hence the revenue for artists.
As Wahal also pointed out, independent artists are more vulnerable to be affected if their work is being used without their knowledge and permission. This called for a deeper discussion that goes beyond the impact of AI on employment opportunities and more about the intersection of machine learning and copyright as well as royalty rights.
Also Read:
- Why Is Universal Music Group Asking Streaming Services To Block AI-Generated Music?
- MusicLM: Five Key Points By Copyright Lawyers On Google’s AI-Based Music Generator
- AI Is Not A Threat To Music Industry If Used In The Right Way: AR Rahman
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