Major Record Labels Sue AI Company Behind ‘BBL Drizzy’

A group of record labels, including the Big Three – Universal Music Group (UMG), Sony Music Entertainment and Warner Records – are suing two of the biggest names in AI generative music creation, alleging that the companies violated “in mass » their copyright.

Both AI companies, Suno and Udio, use text prompts to produce original songs. Both companies have had some success: Suno is available for use in Microsoft Copilot through a partnership with the tech giant. Udio was used to create “BBL Drizzy,” one of the most notable examples of AI music going viral.

The case against Suno was filed in federal court in Boston and Udio’s case was filed in New York. The labels claim that artists of all genres and eras have had their works used without consent.

The lawsuits were filed by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), the powerful group representing the music industry’s major players, and a group of record labels. The RIAA is seeking damages of up to $150,000 per work, as well as other costs.

“These are simple cases of copyright infringement involving mass, unlicensed copying of sound recordings. Suno and Udio are attempting to hide the full scope of their infringement rather than putting their services on a solid, legal footing,” Ken Doroshow, RIAA legal director, said in a press release.

The plaintiffs claim that when they accused Suno of using copyrighted works, the company reversed course, claiming the training data was “confidential business information.” Udio made similar statements in correspondence, according to the lawsuit. “If Suno had made efforts to avoid copying plaintiffs’ sound recordings and ingesting them into its AI model, Suno’s service would not be able to reproduce convincing imitations of such a wide range of expressions human musical performances with the quality praised by Suno”, he added. we read in the complaint.

The lawsuits mark an important step in the contentious fight between the music industry and technology companies offering AI tools. UMG and other music publishers have already sued Anthropic for distributing copyrighted song lyrics when users requested the Claude 2 system there.

Since last year, with a fake fake Drake song generated using AI, artists and labels have waged a public battle against companies they say illegally copied their copyrighted work to form and develop AI tools. Some AI systems are able to reproduce recordings that convincingly resemble well-known artists, raising questions about how much control a musician has over their deep resemblance to the AI.

Platforms like TikTok and YouTube have also been caught in the crosshairs as AI-generated music proliferates online. Earlier this year, music from UMG artists including Taylor Swift was temporarily removed from TikTok after the two companies failed to reach a licensing deal, in part due to concerns about AI . Last fall, YouTube announced a new system for removing AI-generated music content at the request of rights holders. In May, Sony Music sent letters to hundreds of tech companies warning them of “unauthorized” use of copyrighted works.

Suno executives and investors acknowledged the possibility of being sued rolling stone company profile in March. For some, it’s simply the cost of doing business: Antonio Rodriguez, one of Suno’s early investors, told the magazine: “Honestly, if we had had label deals at the start of this business, I wouldn’t probably wouldn’t have invested in it. I think they had to make this product without constraints.

AI companies remain secretive about the data used to train their models. OpenAI is currently being sued by authors and publishers like The New York Times who say their work was included in the training data. Mira Murati, OpenAI’s CTO, repeatedly dodged a question about whether Sora, the company’s AI video generator, was trained on YouTube content.

While much AI-generated music isn’t really a replacement for songs by human artists, there is real fear in the music business and other creative industries that AI content could reduce their ability to earn money from their work. In April, a group called the Artist Rights Alliance wrote an open letter demanding that AI companies “stop using artificial intelligence (AI) to violate and devalue the rights of human artists.”