Artificial intelligence has somehow created a sense of fear in artists whether it will rip them off in the long run. Now the singer-songwriter of Beatles fame, Paul McCartney, is worried that AI could be used to ‘rip off’ artists. He has urged the British government to protect creative industries in the reforms that it will introduce later. During a recent BBC interview, McCartney said, “AI is a great thing, but it shouldn’t rip creative people off […] Make sure you protect the creative thinkers, the creative artists, or you’re not going to have them. As simple as that.”
While talking about protecting copyrights amid the generative AI boom, he said, “You get young guys, girls, coming up, and they write a beautiful song, and they don’t own it, and they don’t have anything to do with it and anyone who wants can just rip it off. The truth is, the money’s going somewhere, you know, and it gets on the streaming platforms – somebody’s getting it, and it should be the person who created it. It shouldn’t just be some tech giant somewhere.”
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Musicians worldwide are facing a growing challenge as AI technologies are increasingly used to create deepfake versions of their work. These AI models, trained on popular songs, can generate new music without compensating the original creators or respecting intellectual property rights. In 2023, Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr, the two surviving members of The Beatles, released Now and Then, a comeback song featuring the late John Lennon’s voice. McCartney revealed that AI was instrumental in isolating Lennon’s vocals from an old demo cassette to bring the song to life.
McCartney’s concerns about AI come shortly after the British government unveiled its AI Action Plan, which outlines significant changes to copyright laws to support AI model training. These proposed reforms could have major implications for artists and their rights in the age of artificial intelligence.
What Did The British Government Say?
The British government say, “The proposals include a mechanism for right holders to reserve their rights, enabling them to license and be paid for the use of their work in AI training. Alongside this, we propose an exception to support use at scale of a wide range of material by AI developers where rights have not been reserved.”
It added, “This approach would balance right holders’ ability to seek remuneration while providing a clear legal basis for AI training with copyright material, so that developers can train leading models in the UK while respecting the rights of right holders.”
The UK government’s proposed ‘opt-out’ copyright system has faced criticism from creators, who argue that it unfairly places the responsibility on them to protect their works from being used as free training data for AI.
