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This may sound like a stupid question (wouldn’t be the first time for me!) BUT, until the cost of training these models goes down, I fail to see how an AI music company focused on Sync will make money:
1) Look at this article, the TLDR is GPT cost $700,000 A DAY to keep running! Now, I’m sure Udio, and the others cost less to train since they are more focused, but then again, I’m not sure of the resources needed to preprocess the audio to allow proper training of the model.
2) New styles will be very hard for these models to emulate as there will be few examples to train on at EXACTLY the time when TV will want the “hottest” sound. How would Suno or Udio have faired when every trailer wanted DubStep and Skrillex was the only artist doing it?
3) Look at your BMI or ASCAP royalties… In the “new world” of streaming, it’s not uncommon for my music to be on 20 shows… major shows with big names…. and the total royalty to be $47.
So I just don’t know how, with the meager royalties, AI companies with a huge overhead are going to survive this environment.
Just FYI, my “day job” is in AI/Machine Learning and I get a front row seat to the budgets needed to stand-up and pay for training enviornments…. not pretty..
@abellboy great topic and great point. It seems to me that AI is always looking backwards. So, staying current with the latest musical trends would be difficult if not impossible.
If specifically mean generating full music with AI, then yeah, it’s simultaneously scary but also has all the issues you mentioned too.
I personally find it frightening in all areas of work, that being said it if makes everyone redundant and I can spend my days just making music in some sort of ai driven utopia (unlikely I know) then I’m game.
It’s good, it will only get better, but I think the bubble will burst with AI, at least in it current iteration. Think the .com situation in the 2000’s. The market is saturated and the public are already kicking back on AI driven content.
I’m aware there’s also issues with rights when it comes to AI music, so large studios won’t touch it. To me, the people doing simplistic jingles, soundbeds etc. will be hit hard. If you’re doing big scores for libraries I don’t think it will impact much, different demographics.
“To me, the people doing simplistic jingles, soundbeds etc. will be hit hard. If you’re doing big scores for libraries I don’t think it will impact much, different demographics.”
FYI: Jingles are big time, prime time. Any track that finds it’s way into a major ad campaign can be a substantial royalty generator that pay just as well as “large scores”. Big national Advertisers will not touch AI music due to the risks, but I am also afraid that we are already in a period of “who would really even know?” Music Beds created by way of AI music generators like SUNO and UDIO can easily be uploaded to various stock music sites and it is not at all out the realm that a TV commercial editor will search and find a 100% AI track and use it on a TV spot. We are kind of at a point where it’s really hard to tell what is AI music and what is human made music? And who is going to stop AI music creators from registering their titles at PRO’s as if they are the actual “composer” of the piece?
This area of copyright law needs immediate attention. The longer we kick the can down the road and pretend this issue is not relevant right now, the greater the risks. Generative AI music sites need immediate government regulation. I wonder what the PMA position is on this? They just held a conference in LA 9-24 to 9-26.
“FYI: Jingles are big time, prime time”
I know, I’m not casting aspersions on jingle writers, but pressing “generate” on a piece of music over and over that is brief is more likely to yield results than longer pieces that need to be listened to in their entirety. Its just playing the statistics.
Thing is, and this has been bugging me for a while, even if they changed the rules, copyright and policy what’s to stop people go to countries that don’t have those rules? I believe, from reading Music Business Worldwide that the majors are going after AI companies, so I think that’s going to have a big impact on the landscape.
I think there is a good chance that for things like “lower tier” cable tv reality shows, etc., once the legalities are resolved, sups will use AI music for background cues. I don’t know how long that will take but they certainly will go with whatever is least expensive. They already pay low (or zero) blanket fees to libraries and, for a long time, libraries have given in to TV production companies taking 50% of the publishing.
When I say “lower tier”, not a judgement, just a descriptor. I’m thinking of some shows on TLC, etc.
As to whether this will take months or years, no idea.
I don’t think *RIGHT NOW* AI is a threat to the higher end of the market, we’ll see.
I think generative AI music going to have a hard time supplanting us. Aside from the many hurdles it has to overcome like re-writing the copyright laws, being sued for stealing training data, and getting good at writing sync music which has a bit of a different remit to commercial music in general then I don’t see how the end user benefits.
The production companies already get music at a low cost, along with all the assets that enables them to better fit it to their project like alt mixes, cutdowns, and stems.
Faffing about with multiple prompts trying to get something that workd sounds like more long winded workflow to me. Maybe I am missing something but the convenience factor does not seem to be there.
AI has not changed anything that I’m doing, and as well it’s still a ways away from really making an impact/competing in the higher tiers. The amount of infringement, and IP risks are scary to Big companies; and I’m seeing a shift towards exclusive companies contractually making sure that the tracks/music/songs are “not AI derived..”
Hi folks, and happy new year everyone.
I’m not writing for a century (AI was not even a thing I guess – shame on me) but I must say I completely agree with @BEATSLINGER, word by word.
I’m also thinking it might be convenient to eventually take a little more time creating music just making sure it’s sounding even more human, emotional, even “imperfect” if you want.
But in general, even talking with people who are studying AI at University (said that nobody knows the future), it seems they all agree human creativity will not be replaced by AI anytime soon.
We should obviously keep our eyes open,but I think musicians will have even a higher value.
Just my 2 cents.It’s disconcerting in every job and every avenue of life. Don’t get my wrong, I’m no luddite, but if the last 20 years has taught us anything technology devalues art. It’s not going to change the fact that I compose, but people citing copywrite laws forget that these things can be changed. It is what it is though, I try not to worry about it because there’s nothing I can do. One thing that may swing in everyone’s favour is that AI is starting to feed on itself and becoming quite deriative, and that’s after only a relatively brief time period. The general public are also quite resistent to it in adverts (in the visual sense), I think you’re going to have to be on the top of your game to survive in the short term, but that’s been the case for a number of years now.
Just realised I’ve commented on a post that I commented on previously, and there’s me calling AI derivative!
@davidagates lol it happens 🙂
But you said something really accurate, we’ll need to be on top of our game, I’m guessing this is gonna happen in almost every business.
Whatever, this thing is running so fast in a way it makes it pretty much unpredictable, generally talking.I’m gonna offer my two cents here. It’s just my opinion so if you disagree that’s fine. But it’s based on some deep conversation I’ve had with some major players in different facets of music.
I remember well when Jason Flom took over Atlantic. He was always tight with the upper execs at Clear Channel (now iHeart). He warned them that they needed to start thinking forward, certainly not backward yet also not just in the present. Radio was going through major changes – FM radio didn’t believe it could be challenged by streaming or by satellite. A close friend is head of affiliate relations with iHeart – and she know all the mistakes that were made.
We are at just another one of these crossroads now – it’s just part of the evolution of art and science. I always found it interesting that copyright law specifically states, “ensuring the progression of science.” It’s almost as if it was predicted that science would have a tremendous effect on everything that could be protected under copyright. Certainly an accurate prediction. But the government that created that copyright law is never going to protect us until many years have gone by and it is usually too late.
Many library owners that have had hugely successful libraries have sold their interests. Warner wants to get out of the library game as well. For some people, continuing doing what they are doing does make sense. They may be finishing up a career and got the benefit of many years of success with writing production music as we have in the past. But for those of us that are mid career, or early career if that’s you – now is the time to think forward. AI will be able to “reason”in the near future. I am personally of the belief that music will always have value somewhere. It just may not be in the same place it had value before. There was a time not too long ago, where content ID did not seem to be worth any money. Look at how quickly that changed.
My point here is that as a community of composers, I hope we can make sure we are thinking forward and ahead and keeping an open mind as to how and where our music can be valued. It IS going to change. I believe that completely.
@yzzman1 I completely agree.
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