Lionel Richie trademarks his voice | Matt Connnarton Unleashed

0:00 Speaker 1: This relates to another thing we talked about recently on

0:02 Speaker 1: the show about who owns your voice, And we talked

0:07 Speaker 1: about this with that whole that story we did. Maybe

0:10 Speaker 1: it was a month ago, the estate of Johnny Cash

0:14 Speaker 1: suing Coca Cola because Coca Cola had some commercials that

0:21 Speaker 1: there's a guy singing in the commercial that kind of

0:24 Speaker 1: sounds a little like Johnny Cash, but to me, did

0:27 Speaker 1: not sound enough like Johnny Cash to you know, to

0:32 Speaker 1: justify the claim that the estate was making in their

0:35 Speaker 1: lawsuit that that Coca Cola intentionally hired a sound alike

0:39 Speaker 1: singer to fool people into thinking that it was Johnny

0:42 Speaker 1: Cash's voice in the commercial. To me, it's somebody singing

0:44 Speaker 1: kind of in the style of Johnny Cash, which it

0:45 Speaker 1: doesn't sound like him. But that opened up a discussion

0:48 Speaker 1: on the show about your voice, owning your voice. You know,

0:52 Speaker 1: obviously everyone you know, whether you're doing anything creative or

0:58 Speaker 1: not or you know, it doesn't matter who you are,

1:01 Speaker 1: you own the rights to your own likeness. You know,

1:04 Speaker 1: somebody can't just take and use your likeness, a visual

1:07 Speaker 1: image of you and just use it for whatever they

1:10 Speaker 1: want to, right, That's that's illegal. You own your likeness.

1:14 Speaker 1: No matter who you are, whether you're famous not famous, whatever,

1:17 Speaker 1: you own your likeness. You own what you create, you

1:19 Speaker 1: own your own. If you great music, you own your music.

1:22 Speaker 1: If you create something else, you own it. You own

1:24 Speaker 1: that right. But what about your voice? What about your voice?

1:29 Speaker 1: And there was something that came up on the show

1:31 Speaker 1: several months ago. I can't remember the name of the company,

1:33 Speaker 1: but Scarlet Johansson was suing a company that had an

1:37 Speaker 1: app that they created. They wanted Scarlett Johansson's voice to

1:41 Speaker 1: be the voice of the app. She said, no, next thing,

1:44 Speaker 1: you know, you can hear her voice on the app

1:46 Speaker 1: because apparently they hired an actress who sounded whose voice

1:50 Speaker 1: sounded very similar to that of Scarlett Johanson or re lease.

1:53 Speaker 1: This is what they claimed. But she was claiming that, no,

1:56 Speaker 1: they just made an AI generated version of my voice.

1:58 Speaker 1: So she sued them and I think she won. They

2:00 Speaker 1: settled or something. But who owns your voice? And it

2:04 Speaker 1: is tricky. It is tricky because some people sound similar.

2:08 Speaker 1: You know, you might think you have a very distinctive voice.

2:12 Speaker 1: Nobody else sounds like you. But guess what, there's somebody

2:14 Speaker 1: out there who does. This is from Digital Musicnews dot Com.

2:19 Speaker 1: This is fascinating to me, and again, I don't think

2:23 Speaker 1: any of this were we not in the AI era,

2:27 Speaker 1: and very early in the AI era of things, I

2:29 Speaker 1: don't think any of this would be happening, including what

2:32 Speaker 1: I'm about to read here from Digital Musicnews dot Com.

2:34 Speaker 1: I don't think any of this would be happening were

2:36 Speaker 1: we not in the AI era. Lionel Richie moves to

2:40 Speaker 1: trademark his voice, filing sound mark applications for easy like

2:46 Speaker 1: Sunday Morning and more. By the way, a sound mark

2:50 Speaker 1: application with the Trademark Office. That's usually for things like

2:54 Speaker 1: you know, you can trademark sounds. I mean, obviously you

2:56 Speaker 1: can trademark songs, but you can also trademark other things

2:59 Speaker 1: like d that belongs to NBC, that's their you know,

3:04 Speaker 1: little song that you might hear at the end of

3:08 Speaker 1: a show, or something you know you can But he's

3:10 Speaker 1: actually filing a trademark application, a sound mark application specifically

3:15 Speaker 1: for his voice. That says here in the era of

3:18 Speaker 1: voice trademarks upon us. It seems that way as Lionel

3:22 Speaker 1: Richie has become the latest entertainment professional to file related

3:25 Speaker 1: applications amid AI's rapid expansion. Specifically, Richie moved to obtain

3:30 Speaker 1: the trademarks yesterday, joining the likes of Taylor Swift and

3:33 Speaker 1: Matthew McConaughey, both of whom have sought voice and Likeness

3:37 Speaker 1: trademarks as of late. According to the filings, Richie is

3:41 Speaker 1: specifically seeking sound marks for snippets of his famed song

3:44 Speaker 1: lyrics Hello is it me? You're looking for? Say you

3:47 Speaker 1: say me easy? Like Sunday Morning and all night long. Unsurprisingly,

3:53 Speaker 1: all the applications mentioned a man saying the lyrics and

3:56 Speaker 1: connection with, among other things, entertainment, information services, stage performances, interviews,

4:02 Speaker 1: and related websites. These specific usages aside, it's not a

4:07 Speaker 1: secret that the aforesaid AI, which is pumping out all

4:13 Speaker 1: manner of sound alike and look like media, played a

4:15 Speaker 1: key part in Richie's submitting the applications. But will they

4:18 Speaker 1: receive USPTO approval? If so, how exactly would the four

4:23 Speaker 1: time Grammy winner look to protect his IP intellectual property

4:26 Speaker 1: undercurrent trademark law. See, we're't a whole new realm here.

4:30 Speaker 1: There's a lot of lawyers, But boy, what a great

4:32 Speaker 1: time to be an attorney. They're going to make a

4:34 Speaker 1: lot of money in the AI era. Admittedly, again getting

4:38 Speaker 1: back to the article here, admittedly we lack definitive answers

4:41 Speaker 1: here On the former front, gurban Ip pointed to the

4:45 Speaker 1: possibility of Richie and others encountering significant legal hurdles with

4:49 Speaker 1: the here to four Little Scene applications. A few adjacent questions,

4:57 Speaker 1: as these applications are seeking to protect actual voices. What

5:00 Speaker 1: happens when and this is my question that I keep raising,

5:03 Speaker 1: what happens when similar sounding entertainers come along? Is this

5:08 Speaker 1: a first come, first served situation that will leave future

5:12 Speaker 1: generations out of luck? And what of existing voice overlap

5:16 Speaker 1: among public figures generally? Nevertheless, McConaughey has already secured several

5:22 Speaker 1: trademarks is Hey Hey Hey application was filed back in

5:26 Speaker 1: twenty twenty three. Furthermore, despite the enforceability questions, it's always

5:34 Speaker 1: possible that voice and likeness trademarks will prove useful in

5:37 Speaker 1: courtroom confrontations down the line. That ties back to another

5:41 Speaker 1: unknown how the NIL focus will evolve in the approaching

5:46 Speaker 1: years between the AI and music related music investment explosions.

5:50 Speaker 1: It seems safe to say that there's never been a

5:52 Speaker 1: bigger emphasis on the rights. Time will tell how this

5:57 Speaker 1: and the corresponding trademark process evolves in the coming years.

6:01 Speaker 1: There's also the chance that Congress will update voice and

6:03 Speaker 1: Likeness law for the AI era What can go wrong?

6:07 Speaker 1: A modified version of the No Fakes Act, the prior

6:11 Speaker 1: iteration of which sputtered out in committee, was introduced last month.

6:15 Speaker 1: By the way, just a quick sidebar on that before

6:18 Speaker 1: we wrap this up, because we do need to show

6:21 Speaker 1: some love to our amazing sponsors. But I'm always nervous

6:28 Speaker 1: when we talk about Congress making laws involving any kind

6:33 Speaker 1: of technology, even though it's obviously necessary. Because and if

6:38 Speaker 1: you don't know why I'm scared about that and why

6:41 Speaker 1: it concerns me, I challenge anyone go on YouTube and

6:45 Speaker 1: find an example. Find a YouTube of Congress people at

6:50 Speaker 1: a committee hearing asking questions of somebody like you know,

6:56 Speaker 1: like Mark Zuckerberg, for example. That's an easy one to find.

7:00 Speaker 1: He's testified I think on more than one occasion before

7:02 Speaker 1: congressional committees. Find Saturday Night Live even oh wait, no,

7:07 Speaker 1: it was bad lip reading, did something about that. But

7:11 Speaker 1: find a video of congress people asking at a committee

7:16 Speaker 1: hearing questions about tech, or if you want to be specific,

7:20 Speaker 1: look up, Look up Mark Zuckerberg testifies before Congress or whatever.

7:23 Speaker 1: And listen to the questions these people ask, and you

7:27 Speaker 1: will immediately And I'm not saying all of them, by

7:30 Speaker 1: the way, some some are well informed and ask good questions,

7:33 Speaker 1: but some don't, And you will immediately become concerned. I

7:38 Speaker 1: promise you. If this is not your reaction, there's something

7:40 Speaker 1: wrong with you. You should immediately become concerned about. You know,

7:45 Speaker 1: some of these you know, septagenarian octogenarian people. Not to

7:50 Speaker 1: be agist, but some of the questions that they ask.

7:54 Speaker 1: When you realize that these are the people who are

7:56 Speaker 1: going to make laws about something that they don't and

7:59 Speaker 1: cannot and will not ever understand. When you listen to

8:02 Speaker 1: some of the questions and how confused they are, it's

8:06 Speaker 1: it always makes me so nervous. So maybe it's just

8:10 Speaker 1: as well that the no fakes act. Well, it might

8:13 Speaker 1: be something that I would support in theory and spirit

8:16 Speaker 1: and judgment, but maybe it's just as well that it's

8:20 Speaker 1: sputtered out because who knows what was actually in it?

8:23 Speaker 1: And uh, and there's probably a bunch of things in

8:27 Speaker 1: it that didn't even apply to the problem at hand,

8:30 Speaker 1: because that happens a lot