Action Required: Stop the spin, put music-makers first in AI deals
Music industry must guarantee music-maker consent, control and compensation
The Council Of Music Makers is calling out the music industry as it starts signing major AI deals: now is the moment to genuinely put human creators at the centre of the AI opportunity.
Universal Music says its deal with Udio demonstrates “our commitment to do what’s right by our artists and songwriters” – now is the moment to actually do right by artists and songwriters.
Spotify claims it is putting “artists first” in AI – now is the moment for digital platforms and their rightsholder partners in the music industry to actually put music-makers first.
No more misleading rhetoric, no more deceitful buzzwords – now is the moment for an industry wide standard guaranteeing music-maker consent, control and compensation.
The three non-negotiables that platforms and rightsholders must respect and deliver:
Explicit Consent: Music-makers must grant explicit consent before their recordings and songs are included in any AI licensing deal. Consent must be opt-in, not opt-out.
Full Control: Music-makers must have full control over how their music is used in AI – on the input when models are trained and on the output when music is generated.
Fair Compensation: All music-makers must be fairly compensated from all AI income, including lump sum payments, equity and legal settlements. All revenue-sharing structures must be clearly and transparently communicated.
A call to action for lawmakers and the industry
CMM calls on rightsholders across the music industry – as well as AI companies and digital platforms – to publicly commit to these three pillars of consent, control and compensation.
CMM urges lawmakers to urgently strengthen copyright and related laws to ensure creator rights are protected in AI, in relation to their performances, productions, lyrics, compositions, voice and likeness.
The Council Of Music Makers is the UK’s unified voice of human creativity in music, bringing together The Ivors Academy, Featured Artists Coalition, Musicians’ Union, Music Producers Guild and Music Managers Forum. We are campaigning together to ensure that AI truly empowers, not endangers, artists, musicians, songwriters, composers and studio producers.
Now is the moment for the industry to commit to a fair future in music. No more misleading press releases claiming to be ‘artist-centric’ while freezing artists and songwriters out. Because a flourishing AI ecosystem can only be built with creators as willing and compensated partners.
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BACKGROUND
There have been big developments in music and AI in recent weeks.
Universal Music has ended its lawsuit against music AI platform Udio and announced a licensing deal to enable a “new cutting-edge generative AI technology” where subscribers will be able to “customise, stream and share music”.
Before that, Spotify announced a partnership with the majors, Merlin and Believe to develop “artist-first AI music products”.
In a memo to staff earlier in October, Universal Music CEO Lucian Grainge promised a “healthy commercial AI ecosystem” in which artists and songwriters can flourish.
Universal has also announced a new deal with Stability AI, and the FT has reported that the majors are close to agreeing big licensing deals with a number of other AI companies.
And yet music-makers – the millions of creators without whom music AI cannot exist – remain in the dark. In July 2023, the Council Of Music Makers asked a series of questions of the major record companies about how they would approach AI licensing deals.
They remain unanswered, despite repeated efforts to secure answers via UK Music and through direct meetings.
Music-makers are justifiably concerned, because we’ve been here before.
When Spotify negotiated its original streaming deals with the music industry in the late 2000s, no record deal existed that anticipated this new billion dollar revenue stream, no record contract provided a framework for how streaming income should be shared between record labels and their artists.
Some independent labels took an actual ‘artist-centric’ approach, engaged with artists and their managers, and adopted fair policies for sharing streaming income.
The majors unilaterally interpreted old, out-dated contracts in a self-serving way, without even telling artists what decisions they had made. More than a decade later, Parliament had to intervene, and most of the issues with the economics of streaming remain unresolved.
The same thing must not happen now that Spotify and others are negotiating deals around AI. No record or publishing deal exists that anticipates the use of music in AI, no record or publishing contract exists that provides a framework for this new revenue stream.
This means that labels and publishers must engage with music-makers and their representatives, to secure explicit consent, and discuss control and compensation.
Universal has already pledged to secure creator consent in two narrow circumstances – when generative AI imitates voice or generates new songs which incorporate an artist’s existing works.
These commitments are welcomed – and seem likely to be relevant to aspects of the Udio deal, given reports that the new product will allow the creation of mash-ups and remixes, as well as tempo changes and voice swapping.
However, the implication Universal is assuming consent in every other scenario is not welcome. It is not enough to just seek consent when an artist’s voice or songs are key components of an AI output, explicit consent is also required whenever music is used for training on the input.
A failure to secure explicit consent means Universal is putting the interests of its shareholders before the human creators it claims to defend.
When it comes to the obligations of AI companies, music-makers are closely aligned with record labels and music publishers.
Billion dollar tech companies must not be allowed to plunder a century’s worth of human creativity, spending millions on lawyers and lobbyists to exploit and expand supposed loopholes in copyright law rather than engaging with the creators without whom they have no business.
Where tech companies take a different approach, and instead ally with the music community, many music-makers are ready to collaborate, with their partners in the music industry and the responsible AI platforms, to pursue new opportunities.
But only when granted consent, control and compensation.
And only when labels and publishers clearly communicate how deals will work; how consent and control will be managed; and how revenues – including lump sum payments, equity and legal settlements – will be shared with each group of music-makers.
Earlier this year a deal was announced between AI company Elevenlabs, independent publisher Kobalt and numerous indie labels via Merlin. With this deal – which we are assured treated recordings and songs equally, a very important precedent – Kobalt and at least some of the participating labels sought music-maker opt-in.
This is the right approach. Music-makers still had concerns about some of the communications, but these companies provided a framework from which best practice can be evolved.
Because if we are going to build the “healthy commercial AI ecosystem” promised by Lucian Grainge, if music-makers, rightsholders and AI companies are going to truly flourish together, then music-maker consent, control and compensation must first be guaranteed.
Which means now is the moment for record labels, music distributors and music publishers to step forward and make that pledge.
To actually engage with music-makers, their representative organisations and our collecting societies to discuss practical and efficient ways to make it happen.
And to collectively call on law-makers to ensure that creator rights – including each creator’s data, personality and publicity rights – are fully enshrined and clearly stated in law.
Then let the AI-powered flourishing of music and creativity begin.