​

Drake’s final straw

​read in browser​

Hey! It's been a wild week with A.I. and music. But before we get to all that, I would love to hear from you.

When you get a chance, can you fill out this quick 5-min survey about Trapital?

Your response to our annual survey helps Trapital continue to deliver the best quality we can on the business of music, media, and culture. These surveys help us learn more about who you are so we can develop the best products possible, and let our partners know that the key decision-makers in this industry help us. Your feedback may also inspire new ideas for 2024 and beyond.

Thanks in advance. It only takes 5 minutes, trust me!

how the music industry can embrace A.I.

By now, you’ve likely heard the viral A.I.-generated song from voices that sound like Drake and The Weeknd. The song isn’t that good, but it’s an improvement from 2020’s TravisBott and other generative music attempts in recent years.

Drake had already his “final straw” days before, after the Ice Spice “Munch” mashup. Universal Music Group has asked streaming services to block these songs and protect their music.

This feels like Napster in 1999. New technology is here and the industry’s protocol is to resist. But what if we could fairly compensate Drake, The Weeknd, Ice Spice, and the various content owners for any likeness or derivations of their work?

So far, these A.I.-generated songs have only gone viral because they’re based on popular artists. People are intrigued by the novelty. The response is “Wow, this is crazy it sounds just like The Weekend,” not necessarily, “Wow, let me add this to the rotation from now on.”

That familiarity works in favor of the most popular artists. Music itself is subject to the power law, which means generative music is also subject to the power law. In other words, it’s in the superstar artist and record label’s best interest to enable experimentation—as long as there’s a fair way to compensate the artist and rights holder. Their work would be the most-accessed music for generative songs anyway, so why not lean in?

In Stratechery, Ben Thompson wrote an article about how YouTube’s approach to music licensing for user-generated content could inform how the industry handles A.I:

On YouTube, TikTok, and most social platforms today, the user just needs to tag the song associated with the artist and it’s cleared. The rights holders will be compensated. (Whether they’re compensated enough depends on the platform, but that’s another debate that we’re not gonna get into today).

Similarly, a user could tag the artist whose voice or likeness was used to create an A.I. song. Ideally, the record labels and streaming services would have agreements in place to count song’s plays as a “stream” or some other measurable unit that can compensate the underlying owners.

The music industry and rights holders are protective of their music, and rightfully so. Most of them don’t want it used in extreme cases, like pornography or controversial political campaigns. But these A.I. songs aren’t quite on that same level of problematic association. Other interactive media formats like gaming, like Fortnite, have found ways to make their environments engaging for fans to build on while protecting their IP from extreme cases.

The music industry’s innovators are eager to expand the pie for the overall music industry. They want to think beyond zero-sum games like competing for market share and revenue splits. They want music to have its Instagram moment that increases the total addressable market for song creation. And they know that A.I. is an opportunity to do that.

There are issues to work out, like any new technology, but the floodgates are already open. If the protocol continues to be “ban, not embrace,” then it may repeat the same mistakes it made at the end of the CD era.

Hope you enjoyed this memo. If so, please share. Forward this email to someone who should read it. Text it to a friend. Drop the link in the group chat.

Share on Twitter, LinkedIn, or Facebook. Or copy and paste the link below.

​https://trapital.co/2023/04/17/how-the-music-industry-can-embrace-a-i/​

money moves

• LL Cool J’s Rock The Bell’s raises $15M Series B​
• the business behind Coachella​
• please fill out Trapital’s annual survey in case you missed it!

enjoy Trapital? share it with a friend

Tell them to sign up. I'll send them next Monday's memo. Hit the link below to share:

Or share Trapital quick via text, email, or Twitter.​

want your company featured in Trapital?

We are looking for a few more sponsors in Q2 who want to reach the artists, creators, and execs who read and listen to Trapital on a regular basis. Want your company to reach Trapital's audience? Reach out to us here.

​