The pittance streaming companies pay to artists is nothing short of highway robbery. Now companies are trying to “steal” music under the guise of “fair copying” to use for their own profits with AI.
The RIAA – Recording Industry Association of America – has filed two copyright infringement suits against Suno and Udio for the mass copyright infringement of recordings by entertainment companies including Sony Music Entertainment, UMG Recordings, Inc., and Warner Records, Inc. across a variety of genres and musical styles.
RIAA Chairman and CEO Mitch Glazier spoke on the situation saying, “the music community has embraced AI and we are already partnering and collaborating with responsible developers to build sustainable AI tools centered on human creativity that put artists and songwriters in charge. But we can only succeed if developers are willing to work together with us. Unlicensed services like Suno and Udio that claim it’s ‘fair’ to copy an artist’s life’s work and exploit it for their own profit without consent or pay set back the promise of genuinely innovative AI for us all.”
The RIAA’s Chief Legal Officer Ken Doroshow added, “these
are straightforward cases of copyright infringement involving unlicensed copying of sound recordings on a massive scale. Suno and Udio are attempting to hide the full scope of their infringement rather than putting their services on a sound and lawful footing. These lawsuits are necessary to reinforce the most basic rules of the road for the responsible, ethical, and lawful development of generative AI systems and to bring Suno’s and Udio’s blatant infringement to an end.”
The RIAA is seeking…
a declaration that Suno and Udio did infringe on copyrighted material
an injunction barring any further infringement
and damages for infringements already incurred
In the suit, the RIAA states that, “AI companies, like all other enterprises, must abide by the laws that protect human creativity and ingenuity. There is nothing that exempts AI technology from copyright law or that excuses AI companies from playing by the rules.”
The lawsuit alleges that the two companies have been infringing copyrighted material from the very beginning of their operations.
Tennessee, which has a rich music culture, has passed a law protecting artists, songwriters, and music professionals against abuse involving AI; ensuring artist’s voices are not replicated without permission.
Hundreds of artists have signed an open letter calling for tech companies NOT to infringe on the rights of the human artists.