Synthetic intelligence tune era platform Udio stated it might give its annoyed customers 48 hours beginning Monday to obtain their songs earlier than the corporate shifts to a brand new enterprise mannequin to adjust to a authorized settlement.
The quick reprieve comes after Udio on Wednesday stated it had settled copyright infringement claims introduced by Common Music, a label with artists together with Taylor Swift, Olivia Rodrigo, Drake and Kendrick Lamar.
AI firms are actually preventing so many copyright lawsuits {that a} tech business foyer group, the Chamber of Progress, final week known as on President Donald Trump to signal an government order directing federal attorneys “to intervene in legal cases” to defend the business’s apply of constructing generative AI instruments by feeding them on copyrighted works.
Citing greater than 50 pending federal instances, the group requested for assist stopping court docket fights resulting in “potentially company-killing penalties” that threaten AI innovation. However artists have warned that AI instruments constructed on their works additionally threaten their livelihoods.
Within the greatest settlement to this point, AI firm Anthropic agreed to pay $1.5 billion — or $3,000 per ebook — to settle claims from authors who alleged the corporate illegally pirated almost half one million of their works to coach its chatbot.
Udio and Common did not disclose the monetary phrases of their new music licensing agreements. In addition they stated they may staff up on a brand new streaming platform.
As a part of the settlement, Udio instantly stopped permitting individuals to obtain songs they’ve created, which sparked a backlash and obvious exodus amongst paying customers.
“We know the pain it causes to you,” Udio later stated in a put up on Reddit’s Udio discussion board, the place customers have been venting about feeling betrayed by the platform’s shock transfer and complained that it restricted what they might do with their music.
Udio stated it nonetheless should cease downloads because it transitions to a brand new streaming platform subsequent yr. However over the weekend, it stated it can give individuals 48 hours beginning at 11 a.m. Japanese time Monday to maintain their “past creations.”
“Udio is a small company operating in an incredibly complex and evolving space, and we believe that partnering directly with artists and songwriters is the way forward,” stated Udio’s put up.
The settlement deal was the music business’s first since Common, together with Sony Music Leisure and Warner Data, sued Udio and one other AI tune generator, Suno, final yr over copyright infringement.
Udio and Suno pioneered AI tune era know-how, which may spit out new songs based mostly on prompts typed right into a chatbot-style textual content field. Customers, who don’t want musical expertise, can merely request a tune within the type of, for instance, basic rock, Nineteen Eighties synth-pop or West Coast rap.
File labels have accused the platforms of exploiting the recorded works of artists with out compensating them.
In its lawsuit filed towards Udio final yr, Common sought to indicate how particular AI-generated songs made on Udio intently resembled Common-owned classics like Frank Sinatra’s “My Way,” The Temptations’ “My Girl,” ABBA’s “Dancing Queen” and vacation favorites like “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree” and “Jingle Bell Rock.”
A musician-led group, the Artist Rights Alliance, stated Friday that the Common-Udio settlement represents a optimistic step in making a “legitimate AI marketplace” however raised questions on whether or not unbiased artists, session musicians and songwriters can be sufficiently shielded from AI practices that current an “existential threat” to their careers.
“Licensing is the only version of AI’s future that doesn’t result in the mass destruction of art and culture,” the group said. “But this promise must be available to all music creators, not just to major corporate copyright holders.”
