The case against Smith highlights a growing problem for the music industry that had largely recovered from the Napster music piracy era of the early 2000s only to be faced with an AI-based threat to revenue from music streaming platforms such as Amazon Music, Apple Music, Spotify and YouTube Music.
This is supposed to make me feel sympathetic to the multi billion dollar corporations? Fuck all the way off with that shit.
Let them fight.
Smith was charged in September 2024 with fraudulently obtaining more than $10m in royalty payments by amassing as many as 661,440 streams daily between 2017 and 2024, yielding annual royalties of $1,027,128.
This already deserves movie adaptation.
Sounds like the botting was the problem, not the AI-generated tracks. He could’ve done the same with sounds of nature or some other shit like that.
Clickbait is strong with this post.
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He was boosting his streams with bots, which is why it’s fraud. By doing this he also tricked the recommendation algorithm to show more of the generated tracks to legit listeners, thereby he removing human listeners from legit artists, hurting their income. (this is also written in the article)
The bots were the real weapon here, but the AI angle points at something worth watching: music streaming platforms rely on the assumption that plays reflect real listeners. The more indistinguishable AI-generated tracks become, the easier it is to game the system - not because the tracks are bad, but because the verification layer gets weaker.
What keeps this system honest now? Mostly good luck and the assumption that most people won’t bother. Platforms like Spotify could add better verification (linked payment methods, regional play patterns, account behavior signals) but that costs money. Easier to just prosecute fraudsters retroactively and call it solved.
Maybe this is why there’s a global coordinated push for age verification?
I’m all for this…but why go after a single man who used a tool premade to do the theft, when they could also go after the dozens of AI companies out there that are literally stealing IP to sell to consumers.
We are getting to the point where a Butlerian jihad will be necessary. Though shalt not make a machine in the image type vibe. The arts exist for people to explore and enjoy.
This criminal is guilty of fraud, similar to Trump. Cunningly he did it in a way that was not easily detectable. How many others are now considering ways to do something similar. So to make a personal decision not to use AI is not going to affect these fraudsters.
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Then Trump is not guilty of fraud because he was only misusing the system that capitalism gave him. Nah, he’s guilty because he chose to commit the crime. Should the system be different, yes.
The same thing here. The man is not addicted to a substance, he saw an opportunity and went for it. Should the system have allowed him? No, however that’s how it is at the moment.
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when do the ai owners start paying the damages on stealing content to power the models? it’s kinda the same…
While I am not against AI as a tool, this person being a tool with AI generated slop remixes everywhere as a hustle is not approve.
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