Matt Connarton Unleashed 6-20-26 hour 3

0:00 Speaker 1: You are listening to WM ANDH.

0:04 Speaker 2: World premiere.

0:07 Speaker 1: Right now on wm n H ninety five point three FM. Matt Connorton Unleashed presents the exclusive world radio premiere of the new single from Flock, coming out June twenty four, But you heard it here first. This is called stop Turning.

0:42 Speaker 3: Howson inside and I can't find these said sell you Andy suit.

0:52 Speaker 2: So a pursuit no fan sing, But I couldn't escape do I can't sing a little way? Ho ho? I can sing a little way?

1:14 Speaker 3: Hey ho? Ho?

1:23 Speaker 2: I canna real sky you steal you see us?

1:29 Speaker 1: So meet to go? I try to lesi who else saything.

1:38 Speaker 2: So farway from me?

1:43 Speaker 4: When I need to holl the side eye?

1:46 Speaker 3: Ho?

1:49 Speaker 1: Ho?

1:53 Speaker 4: Should I need to hold the side? I?

1:56 Speaker 3: Ho?

1:59 Speaker 4: Ho?

2:04 Speaker 2: Who keep brunning? I'll keep what's you.

2:14 Speaker 4: And one sign style souning, I'll sty loving you.

2:25 Speaker 2: Love Love love whens chee running cheep, whats.

3:11 Speaker 4: Tin sign save sunning all style love twens change running chee whats Collen sign stave sunning all sound Love.

3:36 Speaker 1: It now another exclusive world radio premiere. You heard it here first on w m n H ninety five point three FM. Courtesy of Matt Connerton Unleashed, coming out June twenty sixth, the new single from Idle Hive, Blood in My Margarita.

4:03 Speaker 3: She came in out of wrong way saster, She told me her I haven't been so defficult.

4:11 Speaker 2: It's that impossible, just a passing, so she said, alive's never been so nsy.

4:23 Speaker 3: But dissappeared out a pinch out Fendi.

4:26 Speaker 2: You just at tackle a lot. This spends on game so long. Then the short stuff went up in small cash.

4:38 Speaker 3: She lost me under the cold shape had all that givey was?

4:46 Speaker 2: She said?

4:55 Speaker 3: And now this blood and my bargar reader, now this blood in my Bagaria.

5:10 Speaker 2: What's I aroused by the fake conflesh?

5:14 Speaker 3: Lot?

5:14 Speaker 2: Why thinking our fence.

5:17 Speaker 1: Brind or Darling.

5:18 Speaker 2: Don't you know you clean her in my good She set her face wasn't pure Refletcher be find a mirror.

5:31 Speaker 1: In the matter, have an instant or he mince me.

5:34 Speaker 2: She sees herbody lost time. Please. Then the short stuff went up be small cash.

5:45 Speaker 3: She lost me under the cour save no man.

5:51 Speaker 2: He was shape.

6:02 Speaker 3: Thenlle blood and my Margaritada. Thenwe blude in my margaarder.

6:47 Speaker 3: They're shut stuff when not.

6:50 Speaker 2: Baseball, And I last under the coach beyond normand g he was.

7:09 Speaker 3: And now that bood and my margar reader now this bird and my margar reader.

7:24 Speaker 2: The nowther brd and my Margaritada node and my Margaritader.

7:38 Speaker 1: You're listening to Matt Connorton Unleashed on w m and H ninety five point three. Welcome everybody. We have entered our number three new marrow trace of Matt Connorton Unleashed and we are live from the studios of wm NH ninety five point three FM Inglorious, Manchester, New Hampshire. And of course you can stream the show from anywhere. Go to Matt conorton dot com, slash live for all your live streaming options, social media links, contact infoshow, archives, et cetera, et cetera. We also stream to Facebook and YouTube even LinkedIn.

8:18 Speaker 1: Of course, you can always find out more information about the show too at our new site, Matt Connorton Unleashed dot com. Get access to the archives and so forth. We have a searchable archive now on that site, so if you're looking for a specific guest, you can type that into the search bart Matt Connorton Unleashed dot com and it'll pull it right up for you, and of course at Matt conorton dot com we've got the full archive of the show as well, and it's it's on your streaming platform of choice, so wherever you like to get your podcasts, because we are a live radio show, but of course, like every live radio show these days, we're also streaming and it does go up as a podcast on your podcast platform of choice, So please subscribe to the show, or if you're on YouTube, please like and subscribe, etc. Etc. Today is Saturday, June twentieth, twenty twenty six.

9:07 Speaker 1: It is summer. It is my favorite time of year. I think is today the first day of summer according to the calendar or is that tomorrow? I'm not sure to me, June first is summer. It's certainly the start of meteorological summer. Hey, I said it without stumbling over at meteorological Wow. I'm getting good at this. My voice is not cracking as much as I expected it to be when I started the show. If you are listening live on Saturday, if you heard me in the very first hour of the show, my voice was cracking because allergies have been horrendous this year, not just for me, but for many people.

9:39 Speaker 1: But I thought by the time we got to the third hour my voice would be cracking pretty severely, but it seems to be at a minimum, so I'm able to somewhat maintain my dulcet tones, which is a very good thing. But yes, it is, of course Saturday, June twentieth, and we do have some interesting music news and one of these I was very surprised to see.

10:05 Speaker 3: Oh.

10:05 Speaker 1: Before we go any further too, I do want to mention the two world radio premieres that we had that we opened the hour with, of course, and we opened the show earlier with today. These are exclusive world premieres, meaning you will not hear these anywhere else until they are released online. We had Stop Turning, the new single from Flock Flok Flock Stop Turning comes out June twenty fourth, and the other one was Idle five their new single Blood in My Margarita, which comes out June twenty six, So those are not available yet.

10:33 Speaker 1: You heard them here first, literally, you heard them here first on Matt connorton Unleashed here on WMNH ninety five point three FM. So a couple of world radio premieres exclusively here, and thanks to our friends at Big gpr for sending us those They send us a lot of great stuff, So onward and upward in the meantime we go because we do have This relates to something we talked about earlier. We had members of the band The Surge on the show with us in the first hour and we were talking about CDs. Now, if you happen to hear that interview, you might know what I'm referring to, because they're in the UK and they were talking about how the new album Meow, which comes out in August.

11:19 Speaker 1: Their new album coming out in August, it's going to be they're going to have physical CDs. And this is a subject that comes up a lot on the show. When you're releasing music in the year twenty twenty six, how do you do it? Do you just do it digitally? Do you just put it out on the streaming platforms like Spotify and band camp and everything? Do you do physical CDs?

11:38 Speaker 3: Do you do?

11:39 Speaker 1: Vinyl? Vinyl very popular these days. Actually, what was it a few years ago? What was it maybe twenty twenty three or twenty twenty four, the first year since CDs came out that Vinyl actually outsold CDs, and I don't know where CDs fall right now in terms of how they're selling. But new music is still released on CD, certainly still released on vinyl. There's even indie artists putting out cassette tapes, not kidding. You can find them if you don't believe me. So physical media is still very much a thing.

12:10 Speaker 1: But gone are the days, or at least I thought gone were the days of people burning CDs. Now, if you are old enough to remember, there was a time when you could burn CDs. Burning meaning copying again for you very young people who don't know what I'm talking about, When you take a CD and you copy it,

12:34 Speaker 1: that is, whether or not that's okay or ethical is a subject that's been of debate since I was a kid. Geez. When I was a kid, we would copy cassette tapes. You know, if you had a dual cassette deck, you know, you could you could put a cassette in one side, press play on the other side, press press record, And sometimes that's how I would get music from my friends and they would get music from me. We would we would trade that way, you know, just I'll copy that tape for you, I'll copy that cassette but you know, eventually it became all about burning CDs.

13:06 Speaker 1: Anyone who was in a band in say the nineties or two thousands up until I don't know, maybe ten years ago, maybe not quite, but there was a period of time where if you were in a band, you might be burning CDs. You might be burning CDs to give out to people. You might be burning CDs to give to radio stations. You know, every once in a while, someone will bring us to CD here, you know, when we have guests in studio, they'll bring a CD, a physical CD. But it's not to play on the air. Even though we do have a functioning CD player here, it's not to play on the air.

13:43 Speaker 1: That's all done digitally. We just everything's online. They email us the tracks ahead of time. But you know, but they'll still they'll still bring in a physical CD and all the packaging and everything if they're releasing it on CD, because it is cool to have the physical media. You know, if you're a nerd like me, you like reading inner notes and things like that and have the artwork. I'll tell you when I first started interviewing musicians, and I've been at this a long time, I'm dating myself but when I first started, it was not uncommon, not only for a musician to hand me a CD and not email the tracks ahead of time.

14:23 Speaker 1: That's how long I've been doing this, where even though the technology existed, rather than emailing me the tracks, a musician who is going to be a guest on a show that I was doing, might actually hand me a burned CD with just a burned CD with and they write on it in magic mark or what it is, and then hand it to me. And then it's not even in a case. This would happen all the time, wouldn't even be in a case, and they would hand it to me on their finger. They would put the CD to put their finger, their index finger through the hole in the CD.

14:55 Speaker 1: And that's how they would hand me the CD and say, this is for the radio show or this is for the podcast. Thank god, those days are gone. I have to be honest with you. It never left. Not that I was ever a jerk about it, but it never left the greatest impression on me. When a guest or a potential guest would hand me their music on their finger, they would put their the CD on their finger, their burned CD that they wrote on it, labeled it with magic marker, and then ah, here you go. That never left the most professional impression, but it would happen more than you might think.

15:36 Speaker 1: So I prefer it the way we have it now. Everything is done digitally. If you want to bring me a CD, great, And I love getting CDs from our guests with the artwork and everything in the full package. But I do not miss the days of burned CDs, many of us. Again, if you're old enough to remember, you might have had one of those CD booklets that you would drive around in your car with. Right you got the CD booklet, you're putting the CDs and the CD player, and a lot of them were burned CDs, and and some of them you might not even know what they are because the magic marker wore off on them, but a lot of them would be burned CDs.

16:12 Speaker 1: So but anyway, that's a thing of the past, right, even though CDs still exists, and they're still making CDs and artists are still releasing music on CDs, burned CDs are a thing of the past, right, I'm building to something here, and and and those debates about whether or not it's okay to burn a CD or is that a form of piracy? That's also a thing of the past, right, because no one's burning CDs anymore.

16:38 Speaker 2: Right?

16:39 Speaker 1: Okay, this is from Digitalmusicnews dot com, one of my favorite websites for music industry news. Oh by the way, uh, cheap and shameless plug. You can also now with greater consistency, because we're going to be putting up a lot of content on on both ipmnation dot com and on Matt connorton unleashed dot com. You are going to see a lot more content and a lot more articles and blogs. Uh, and that has already started. So just a quick shameless plug if you want some. For example, a couple new articles on ipmnation dot com all about college radio.

17:22 Speaker 1: They're there, check them out, please enjoy them. You're gonna see more on Matt connorton unleashed dot com, not just the show, but other show related content that isn't necessarily audio, but some articles just want to mention that. Get that in there anyway. Okay, So getting back to this, So Digitalmusicnews dot com has an article titled and this is the actual title. Yes, this is a twenty twenty six headline. Judge issues two year jail sentence for burning and selling CDs? Now who had that on their Bigo card in twenty twenty six.

17:57 Speaker 1: First of all, somebody acts in any time, in any year, in any era, somebody actually getting in trouble and actually facing some sort of legal consequence for burning the CD. Unheard of nobody whoever got caught doing that, whoever got in trouble for doing that?

18:17 Speaker 3: Right?

18:17 Speaker 1: I mean yeah, maybe some people, but very few. Right, You just don't expect it. Nobody expects to get caught or punished, even if you are caught right for that, for burning a CD. Come on, but actual legal jeopardy like a two year jail sentence for burning and selling CDs in the year twenty twenty six. All right, well let's see again. This is from Digital Musicnews dot com. A UK man. Oh, it's funny too. This happened in the UK. I didn't preread this. I didn't have time. This happened in the UK. And uh, you know we were talking earlier to the Surge members of the band The Surge, who are from the UK, and we were talking about CDs.

18:55 Speaker 1: So all right. A UK man has received a twenty six month prison sentence after pleading guilty to the unauthorized mixing and selling of CDs in violation of copyright law. Now, I don't know. Maybe they're strict about that in the UK. That would never happen in the United States. I don't think it would. Maybe it hasn't. I just don't know about it. But again, in any era, can you imagine somebody actually being sentenced to prison for twenty six months over burned CDs? It just wouldn't happen, right, I don't think it would.

19:30 Speaker 1: Am I wrong? All right? It says here. The article goes on, if you thought the headline was from two thousand and two, you'd be forgiven. Instead, it's twenty twenty six and a man in the UK has been sentenced after pleading guilty to the unauthorized mixing and selling of CDs in violation of copyright law. Forty seven year old Mark Kerns was issued a twenty six month prison sentence, which will be suspended for eighteen months. He must also carry out two hundred and fifty hours of unpaid community service work.

20:09 Speaker 1: Oh mute the mic for a second. Speaking of allergies, my nose is getting very itchy, all right, Well, at least so at least this sentence is suspended. I assume when we say suspended sentence, I know what that means in the United States. Not from personal experience, mind you. I've never been in any trouble, but I know what that means in the United States. If your sentence is suspended, you're not going to do any time. The only way you're going to do any time is if you violate parole, if you get into some other kind of trouble, then that sentence can become unsuspended pretty quickly.

20:40 Speaker 1: But so it sounds like he's not actually going to prison if it's a suspended sentence. I assume,

20:47 Speaker 1: Oh wait a minute, no, I misread that he was issued a twenty six month prison sentence which will be suspended for eighteen months. So the twenty six month sentence, but it's suspended for eight Now I'm a little bit confused. What does that mean? So is it suspended for eighteen and then when he gets to month nineteen he has to go to prison for a few I don't know what that means. I guess it doesn't matter. I'm getting bogged down in details that are not necessarily relevant to the heart of the story.

21:19 Speaker 1: Continuing on again, This is from Digital Music News dot com. Kerns pleaded guilty to a number of charges at Whole Crown Court and was sentenced on Thursday. The sentence follows a lengthy investigation that began in mid twenty nineteen after the British phonographic industry became aware of the offenses in twenty eighteen. A warrant was issued in September twenty twenty two. Again, maybe they're much more strict about that. I mean, the laws exist here, but actual enforcement maybe they're more strict about that in the UK.

21:54 Speaker 1: Can you imagine here in the United States police show up at your door they've got a warrant for your arrest. You've been burning CDs. I mean, it's unfathomable, is it not? So? A spokesperson for the Yorkshire Council said, quote, this activity enabled him to commercially exploit protected material, generating income at the expense of legitimate artists and businesses within the music industry. Unquote. Maybe I don't know, Maybe it's that he was selling them. If he had just been burning them, he probably would have been fine.

22:31 Speaker 1: But was he But how much could he have even been? Prop Like? What was he doing? Was he burning them and then just selling them. Like, where was he selling these? Again? It's the year twenty twenty six. Who's buying these? Who's even buying these from him? Who?

22:49 Speaker 3: Like?

22:49 Speaker 1: What is the market for this? So this guy's I get it. He's burning the CDs and then he's selling them to make money. Who is buying the burns from him? Is he selling them people on the street? Is he like the guy like you know, you'd see this, uh,

23:09 Speaker 1: like on seventies TV shows or something, you know, like like on seventies Buddy cop shows like Startskin and Hutchet or whatever. You know, you'd see the guy, the guy on the street who's selling stolen watches. You know, he opens his jacket and you see all these stolen watch It's almost comical, right, it is kind of comical. You see all these stolen watches on the inside of his jacket. He's trying to sell you a Rolex or something, or a counter or their counterfeit watches something like that, Right, Is that what this guy was doing with the CDs?

23:35 Speaker 1: Is he on the street and he's just like opening his jacket and saying, hey, do you want to buy a burned CD? Is that what this guy was doing, because because who's buying these from him? That's what I don't understand. I mean, if you're going to make money at something, be it a legal and legitimate or something illicit, like you know, illicit quote unquote like burned CDs, there has to be a market for that. Who is the market for this? The more I think about it, the more bizarre this gets. But according to the spokesperson for the Yorkshire Council, this guy was commercially exploiting protected material.

24:19 Speaker 1: Ugh, let's see. Cabinet member Lynn Healing said, quote counterfeit and unauthorized goods undermine fair trading and can generate significant illicit profit. We will not hesitate to take robust enforcement action where offenses are identified, and this sentence sends a clear message that such activity will not be tolerated unquote. I'm stuck on the phrase generate significant illicit profit by selling these to who? Who was buying That's what I want to know, And I have a feeling we're not going to learn the answer in this article.

25:02 Speaker 1: Who was buying these? Where was the profit coming from? Is there a website you can sell these on burnedcds dot com I'm sure it would cost more to mail it than what anyone would pay for a burned CD. Oh you want to? You know, if you want a copy of Elton John's greatest hits, it's gonna cost you ten bucks at the music store. I'll sell you a burned copy for fifty cents plus shipping. It doesn't sound like a sound business model. I don't know how this works, all right? Getting back to the article, Oh, here we go.

25:47 Speaker 1: Interestingly, sources failed to identify whether Kerns was selling CDs online via social media, from a physical product stall. I'm sorry, I have a physical market stall, or perhaps from the trunk of his car, old school style. However, his CD burning and selling business must have left a significant and traceable commercial footprint for the UK government to have gotten involved to such an extent. Yes, is that even possible? Says here. The fact that CDs are not an entirely abandoned physical medium probably further added in his getting caught.

26:29 Speaker 1: As the vinyl boom has been hit with production snags, the CD industry has remained smaller but still notably bustling since its initial popularity over forty years ago, particularly in the K pop and J pop scenes, CDs and cassettes remained popular among fans for their ability to include limited or unique alternative album covers and photos. To that end, artists like Taylor Swift have continued to find success with the medium alongside vinyl in the West, streaming having largely taken over physical alternative alternatives over the past two decades.

27:06 Speaker 1: That's the end of the article. I want to know how this guy was selling them and how he was possibly making money at this This seems so bizarre to me, but yeah, I mean, CDs have had a resurgence, Vinyl of course, never went away and continues to flourish. And even cassettes, you know, that came up too again during my interview with the Surge. I mean, it's hard to believe. I think it was probably about ten years ago. I've told the story on the show before. Forgive me if it's if you've heard it, but just very briefly, I've told the story.

27:36 Speaker 1: I think it was about probably ten years ago. I was on band camp dot com and again, you know, I'm a big fan of band camp dot com, and I was looking for local artists and I happened to find and I can't remember the name, but they were a band from Keen Keen, New Hampshire who was selling cassettes, and I thought, oh, I saw this, and I thought, what an interesting sort of novelty thing, cassettes. They're actually selling cassettes, very retro kind of cool. I guess I don't know how many they're actually selling, who knows.

28:11 Speaker 1: But then I started poking around and I realized that there were all these sort of indie pop artists on band camp who were selling cassettes. Cassettes. It made this weird comeback. I guess if you enjoy the sound of tape hiss and all the trouble it causes when your cassette gets caught up in the in the gears, you know what a pain. I don't miss cassettes. I mean, yeah, I have nice memories of when I was a kid recording songs off the radio on my cassette.

28:42 Speaker 3: Oh.

28:42 Speaker 1: I hope these prosecuters in the UK don't hear about that. They want to track me down, have me extradited, because I'm sure at some point I recorded artists from the from the UK on my little cassette player. But you know, but there were a lot of trouble I remember when I was a kid actually using scotch tape too. If a cassette that I really loved, if it broke, using scotch tape to actually tape it back together, and sometimes it would actually work out, and sometimes it would not. But yes, that is a headline.

29:15 Speaker 1: In the year twenty twenty six, judge issues two year jail sentence for burning and selling CDs. I do want to know more about this guy. I'm gonna keep an eye on this story going forward because I want to know how he was doing it, how it could have possibly have been profitable before him, and how they could have been a big enough deal that UK prosecutors actually said we need to put this man in prison. These are answers that I see. Okay, we have time. I want to get to another thing.

29:52 Speaker 1: This is okay. This is from Music Business Worldwide dot com, another great site for music industry news. But this involves

30:05 Speaker 1: this involves our politicians, and we don't do politics on this iteration of the show, not anymore. We keep that for the podcast. We only do music and interviews and music industry news and so forth on the radio version of the show here at WMNH. But we do have politicians who are making laws about the music industry and about AI and all this stuff. And we've talked about the No Fakes Act on the show, which is trying to fight the proliferation of deep fakes. And these are all things that are going to continue to be problems that our politicians try to solve.

30:46 Speaker 1: Now, if you're a long time listener of the show, you've heard me talk about how I always get nervous when people in the House and Senate start talking about making laws making regulation about technology, because they very often have no idea what they're talking about. And some of them the questions that they ask in these Senate hearings, some of these people I wouldn't trust to be a shift manager at a Burger King, let alone making decisions about technology and how technology is to be used or not used, and how it must be regulated going forward.

31:24 Speaker 1: I get very nervous. And the example that I always like to use is if you don't believe me, if you think of being hyperbolic, go on YouTube. Not right now, wait till after the show, but when you get a chance, go on YouTube. Just look up Senate hearing Mark Zuckerberg. When you can find a congressional hearing of congress critters asking questions of Mark Zuckerberg. He's he's testified before Congress on multiple occasions. I believe and listen to some of the questions that these octogenarian and septagenarian senators and congressmen ask in these hearings, and the conclude usion that you might come to very quickly is holy crap.

32:03 Speaker 1: I do not want these people making decisions about technology and making laws and regulations about technology because they don't know what they're talking about. They're deeply confused, and they have no business getting involved in any of this, no thank you. They can only make things worse, not better. And to be fair, some of them are well informed and ask good questions, but a lot of them are just you know, and they're not serious people anyway. They're not there to solve anything. They're there to get some camera time that they can then use in a campaign ad the next time they're running for reelection.

32:39 Speaker 1: Let's be honest, okay, but this is important. So again from Music Businessworldwide dot Com, no fakes Senate panelbacks bill that could cost platforms seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars per AI. Deep fake all right, let's take a look at this. The US Senate Judiciary Committee has advanced the No Fakes Act, the bipartisan bill that would create a federal rite protecting Americans voice and visual likeness from AI generated deep fakes. And again, that's something that's come up a lot on the show too, just recently.

33:17 Speaker 1: In fact, just last week we were talking about Lionel Richie has moved to trademark his voice, his actual voice, and can you do that? Will that work? What about people who sound similar? Obviously, it's one thing to trademark your visual likeness. You own your likeness no matter who you are, whether you're famous, whether you're not famous, whether you create any kind of art, whether you are completely anonymous in the world. Nobody can just take your visual likeness, your image and do whatever they want with it.

33:46 Speaker 1: You own that. But what about your voice anyway? Nal Richie says, yes, you can trademark your voice, and others have said that too, and that might be where things go. But again, this is about the No Fakes Act again, the bipartisan bill that would create a federal right protecting Americans voice and visual likeness from AI generated deep fakes. The Committee passed the bill unanimously by voice vote on Thursday. Oh wow, so then you've got all these bipartisan this bipartisan support. Republicans and Democrats unanimously agree on something.

34:21 Speaker 1: What could go wrong might be a good thing. I don't mean to be so cynical. Might be a good thing. I didn't preread this. I'm trying to keep an open mind. Might be a good thing. Let's see. So they passed the bill unanimously by voice But this is not a vote in Congress. This is on a committee. The committee. The Senate Committee passed the bill unanimously by voice vote, according to Deadline, which noted that three Republican Senators Mike Lee, Ted Cruz, and Eric Schmidt, raised First Amendment concerns.

34:56 Speaker 1: Yes, ah, that pesky first amendment clearing the committee sends them by the way, I don't like, I don't like I don't know anything about Eric Schmidt. I don't like Mike Lee or Ted Cruz. But just because I don't like them doesn't mean that they're wrong about everything. I'm not saying I agree with their I'm not saying again, I'm keeping an open mind on this a deep fakes act. But somebody. There should always be at least one person in the room who says it, and by it, I mean what about the First Amendment.

35:32 Speaker 1: You should always have at least one person in every single room where a discussion like this is happening, who says that, I think, okay, it says here. Clearing the committee sends the bill toward a vote by the full Senate, after which it would still need to pass the thousand Representatives and be signed by the President before becoming law. The Nurture Originals, Foster Art, and Keep Entertainment Safe No Fakes Act would give every American, not only public figures, a federal right to authorize or block AI generated replicas of their voice and likeness.

36:11 Speaker 1: It carves out First Amendment uses such as news reporting and parity, and would establish a single national standard, a notice and takedown system for online services, and a counter notice process for material.

36:27 Speaker 2: Removed in error.

36:29 Speaker 1: Two things about that little paragraph that jump out at me, actually several things. Let's take the whole thing. It carves out First Amendment uses such as news reporting and parody. Parody must be protected, Parody and satire must be protected, so you don't want to accidentally make a law that infringes on that, and that gets people in trouble for engaging in parody and satire. That is critically important. Okay, next part of this and would establish a single national standard. A single national standard always concerns me.

37:14 Speaker 1: But maybe that's better than having a patchwork of state laws. Maybe maybe not. I don't know. I'm keeping an open mind. I'm not sure. Okay. A noticing takedown system for online services and a counternotice process for material removed in error. That's something I always worry about, people getting caught in the net who shouldn't be.

37:44 Speaker 1: It's happened to me with YouTube. I've gotten caught in the net on things where I've had videos taken down that shouldn't have been. I always appeal it. Sometimes I win, sometimes I lose. All right, but all of this is

38:01 Speaker 1: it makes me nervous. I'm not saying any of this is bad. I'm not saying that these are bad, that this is a bad idea. I'm just saying I don't trust this is I don't trust the government to get this right, and neither should you. It says here penalties under the bill are tiered five thousand dollars per work for an individual, twenty five thousand dollars per work for a company that creates or distributes a replica end up to seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars per work for an online service that fails to comply.

38:36 Speaker 1: Okay, let's stop there for a moment. Now, we're really getting into some trouble we have talked about on the show before. You know this notion that people have tried to make laws, people whom I tend to agree with politically but disagree with on this subject. They have tried to make laws saying that social media sites have to be fully responsible for what their users post, meaning if somebody, for example, if somebody posts something, if a lot like this were to actually go into effect, like what some people have tried to pass, if somebody posts something on social media on say, somebody posts something on Facebook and there's something illegal about the post, like maybe they're violently threatening somebody, which is illegal.

39:28 Speaker 1: That's criminal threatening. You can't do that and Facebook doesn't catch it. Facebook does police that stuff, or you know, you can report posts like that. But what if somebody posts something like that, Facebook doesn't catch it right away, and then they're they're getting fined by the government for allowing this post to be on their platform or YouTube. Somebody posts a video on YouTube that there's some sort of illegal activity going on in the video and it doesn't get flagged and removed right away, then these social media platforms would be held liable for what goes on their platforms, for everything that goes on their platforms, for everything their users do on their platforms, they would be liable or oh or a great example.

40:18 Speaker 1: You know, there was a Supreme Court decision about this and this was one of the Again I'm not a fan of the current Supreme Court as it is currently made up, but they got this one right. But it was about should Internet service providers be held responsible for everything that their users do using that service? So if someone does something illegal, say somebody has Exfinity for their Internet service and they do something illegal, should Exfinity be held liable for that? Now, the answer to all of these questions is no, you can't hold internet service providers responsible for everything their users do.

40:59 Speaker 1: You do you want internet service providers to go out of business because they're getting fined by the government every day over things that their users do that they can't possibly that the service prider can't possibly control. Do you want to effectively end social media? Some people would like to do you want to effectively end social media as we know it? Because all these social media companies are now held responsible for every little thing that everyone on those services, everything that they do, you can't do it.

41:28 Speaker 1: These companies do police their content. I have had many things over the years removed from Facebook because I allegedly broke some rule or something. Most of the time they don't even tell you what the rule was that you broke or what the post was reported for. I've had things again. I mentioned YouTube. I've had my problem with anybody who's a content creator has I had problems with YouTube. But this idea that now if you put a deep fake, if you make a deep fake, that violates the Deep Fakes Act or the No Fakes Act.

42:16 Speaker 1: I'm sorry, you know, if you put that, if you distribute that using an online service, and that online service fails to act, fails to see it, flag it, remove it, whatever they're gonna do, they could be fined three quarters of a million dollars by the government.

42:37 Speaker 1: I don't think that's a good idea because what's going to happen is this. If that's the law, and every time you put a video on YouTube and there's something in it, there's some AI generated content in that video, and YouTube is staring down the barrel of a potential three quarter of a million dollar fine because you put something on their platform that violates this new law. Imagine how much stuff is going to be getting taken down from YouTube on a daily basis because there's even the slightest possibility that YouTube is going to pay a heavy fine for allowing anything that even comes close to violating this law and the parameters set within it.

43:30 Speaker 1: So that's not workable. It's the kind of thing where you've got to hold individuals accountable, not the platforms. And all you can do is encourage the platforms to hold individuals accountable. But it has to be the platforms doing it. If it's the government doing it, then you're going to destroy these platforms in the process. Now, all that's assuming that any of this actually ends up being enforced in the end, which you may not. They may not. Okay, getting back to the article again. This is from Music Business Worldwide dot com in a statement issued on Thursday.

44:09 Speaker 1: RIAA chairman and CEO Mitch Glazier applauded the steadfast leadership of the bill's lead sponsors Senators Marsha Blackburn, Republican of Tennessee, Chris Coons, Democrat of Delaware, Tom Tillis, Republican of North Carolina, and Amy Klovichar, Democrat of Minnesota, and Representatives Maria Elvira Salazar, Republican of Florida, Madeleine Dean Democratic Pennsylvania, Nathaniel Morin, Republican of Texas, Becca Blint, Democrat of Vermont, and Laurel Lee, Republican of Florida. Glazier said, quote, we are encouraged by today's passage in the Senate Judiciary Committee and look forward to the bill's passage into law later this year.

44:50 Speaker 1: Unquote. He's president of the RIAA. That's the organization that certifies. One of the things that they do is they certify albums. So if an album sells a million copies, it's a platinum record, they certify that. That's who certifies that officially, is the RIAA. If an album sells half a million copies, it's certified gold. They do that. That's one of the things that they do. I would suggest to Mitch Glazier

45:21 Speaker 1: think about how think about how this might impact the music industry in a negative way. Again, if you begin to scare the holy hell out of all of these platforms because now they think the government is going to be coming after them with these very large findes. The effect of that might be that everything becomes so safe and sanitized that some artists are not being promoted or able to promote themselves in the way that they once were. There could be a knock on effect here that could be very bad for the music industry, the chilling effect that it's going to come from this, um Glazier said more.

46:07 Speaker 1: He said, quote an extraordinary cross sector coalition including the creative community, child safety groups, free market groups, labor unions, free speech advocates, and AI developers have come together to support these protections for Americans voice and likeness from exploitive digital deep fakes. And consumers agree ninety two percent worry about the impact of AI deep fakes on authenticity, society, and culture. The No Fakes Act answers the call unquote. By the way, just to be clear, it count me in on that ninety two percent.

46:35 Speaker 1: I'm worried about all this too. I don't want you to think that. I'm not. I'm just worried about these platforms getting fined out of existence by the government every time somebody posts a deep fake. I'm worried about that. I'm worried about you know, somebody who who it makes a music video using AI and they post it on YouTube, and then YouTube gets hit with their first three quarters of a million dollar fine from the government because maybe one of the actors in the music video looks like somebody famous.

47:23 Speaker 1: Oh, it's a deep fake now, and then YouTube starts, you know, closing all these accounts on YouTube because they're going to get very scared about taking any chances. They don't want to fight over this in court. Let's see the article says here it is a third attempt to pass the bill. A version introduced in July twenty twenty four ran out of time before that Congress ended, and in April twenty twenty five reintroduction failed to advance out of committee. A bipartisan group reintroduced the latest version, S four five nine to one the Senate and HR eight nine one five in the House on May twentieth.

48:04 Speaker 1: The bill has drawn support from Universal Music Groups, ONNY Music and Warner Music Group alongside Spotify, Google, Open, AI, IBM, and YouTube, as previously reported by MBW. Now, why would these groups or these companies, why would they support something that potentially could end up costing them a lot of money in fines? Why would they support that? I'll tell you why. What do they all have in common? Is there anybody in that list of people who you've never heard of? I mean, I think most people have heard of Universal Music Groups Onny Music Group and Warner Music Group.

48:49 Speaker 1: Right, you've certainly heard of Spotify, Google, Open, AI, IBM, and YouTube. There's nobody who hasn't heard of those, right, those are the big guys. If there's a possibility that a law like this could start to wipe out the smaller guys, the upstart services, you know, the the whatever, some video platform that wants to compete with YouTube, Huh, maybe this no Fakes Act, with its extraordinarily large finds, maybe it can be used to wipe out some of the competition. I can't think of any other reason why they would support this, because, again, it has the potential to cost everybody a lot of money.

49:31 Speaker 1: But but if you can get away with what you're doing because you're big enough, too big to fail. You're big enough to get away with what you're doing, but somebody smaller can't weather the storm that's going to come with this law if the government enforces it and levies the's fines those smaller companies, like who's a competitor to YouTube daily Motion? Maybe people are putting deep fake videos on daily Motion. Daily Motion gets fined out of existence. That's a victor for YouTube, right a little more here.

50:04 Speaker 1: The federal bill follows Tennessee's Elvis Act, the first US state law to treat a person's voice as a protected right, which took effect in twenty twenty four. A federal digital replica framework is also among the recommendations in the White House's National Policy Framework for Artificial Intelligence, which the administration released in March. The framework says Congress should consider establishing a federal framework protecting individuals from the unauthorized distribution or commercial use of AI generated digital replicas of their voice, likeness, or other identifiable attributes, while providing exceptions for parity, satire, and news reporting part of the problem too.

50:41 Speaker 1: And I didn't mention this earlier, and I should have when we were talking briefly about parity and satire these things can be subjective. What one person thinks is parody or satire another person might think is hate speech. And hate speech is never protected. I mean, in theory, it's you could argue it even hate speech is protected by the First Amendment. But I don't know that that part's gonna get tricky. That part always gets tricky. Uh. Not every stakeholder backs the bill, the Electronic Frontier Foundation.

51:22 Speaker 1: Now see see who's heard of the Electronic Frontier Foundation?

51:27 Speaker 3: Have you?

51:28 Speaker 1: I haven't. This is a smaller entity, but they oppose the bill. Why probably because they know they're gonna The big guys are a lot less likely to get wiped out. But somebody we've never heard of, they could be in danger from this. It says the Electronic Frontier Foundation has urged Congress to reject it, warning it could become a tool for online censorship that sweeps up parody, news and criticism. Oh yeah, it's coming. The companion Bill HR eight nine one five was referred to the House Judiciary Committee after its introduction and has not yet had a markup.

52:06 Speaker 1: So there you go. That's it for that. I think that's about it for us. Do we have time to get one more thing in. I had a few different news stories here. Oh this is well, we got a couple things here. I can't sneak one more thing in. Well this might be this might be some competition for YouTube. We won't read the whole article, but Spotify now the headline. This is from Music Business Worldwide dot com. Spotify opens direct uploads for music videos and live performances in beta. So Spotify is opening up to video basically, so now not only will Spotify of audio, but Spotify will have music videos on it and live performances.

52:56 Speaker 1: That could be a real threat to YouTube, because I mean, some people all they use YouTube for is for music videos. It's interesting too with music videos. If you talk to someone who doesn't know anything about the current music business and how it all works, a lot of people will tell you. I hear people my age and younger say this, and it's hard to even explain it to them. They'll say things like, oh, I miss MTV. Now music videos don't even exist. I wish there were still music videos. I used to love music videos, And whenever someone says that to me, I just want to grab them by the shoulders and say and shake them a little bit and say have you never heard of YouTube.

53:40 Speaker 1: Look, there are more music videos than ever. For anyone who doesn't know this, I'm not trying to make fun of you, but anybody who watch it, because I hear it all the time. It's not like something I hear once in a while. I hear all the time. I see people posting about it on social media. I mean, it's kind of a boomer thing to say, but even Gen xers will say this, Oh I miss music videos. There's no music video anymore. Guys, there's more music videos than ever. Everyone makes music videos now, and if you're a major artist, who can afford it some of the some some major label artists.

54:11 Speaker 1: Beyonce has done it, Metallica has done it. Other bands have done it. When they put out a new album or an EP, they'll release a music video for every single track. Everybody's making videos now. There are more music videos than there have ever been. I'm sorry you miss MTV and is VH one still a rounder? Did that go away too? I'm sorry you miss your video channel, but you can go on YouTube and see all kinds of music videos. You have more access to music videos than you ever have at any point in history.

54:43 Speaker 1: It's just a little bit of a pet peeve I have when I heard, oh, there's no more more music videos. There's more music videos than ever. And if you long for, if you're pining for the music videos of your youth, when you used to sit and watch MTV.

54:58 Speaker 3: I get it.

54:59 Speaker 1: I get I grew up in that era. But guess what think of a video you saw when you were a kid that you watched on MTV. I guarantee you it's on YouTube. You can watch it right now, or better yet, explore some new music because there's lots of music videos. If you want music videos, there's lots and lots and lots and lots and lots of music videos. So please, just everybody stop with the uh oh MTV is dead and there's no more videos. Yeah there are. Sorry, how's a pet peeve of mine. I got a little snarky about that.

55:32 Speaker 1: I don't mind when boomers say it, but when people my age say it, when Gen xer say it, it's like you make us all sound old because you're saying something that's not true. There are more. I'm sorry you miss MTV, but please, you're dragging our entire generation down when you say stupid things that are objectively false and easily disprovable. You know, to stop it, all right, We're just about out of time. I do want to get at least one more song into end today's show, but I do want to thank everybody first who joined us today.

56:15 Speaker 1: Of course, in the first hour we had the surge. In the second hour we had low Sunday both great bands. Really enjoyed talking with everybody. Our number three guests did not work out due to a miscommunication. We'll see if we can reschedule them. It's bummer. I was really looking forward to talking with the members of Beaker, but that did not work out. But that happens sometimes. It's okay.

56:38 Speaker 3: Though.

56:38 Speaker 1: We had plenty of music industry news to talk about, as we always do. There is always so much going on. If you missed any part of today's show, it will be up in just a little bit, of course. It goes up on Wmnhradio dot org. You can also find it on my website, Matt connorton dot com. You can find it at Matt Connerton Unleashed dot com. It's on YouTube, it's on facebooo, it's even on LinkedIn. We put it everywhere, and please, of course, subscribe to the podcast. You know it goes out to Spotify and everywhere else.

57:08 Speaker 1: Subscribe on your podcast platform of choice. We really appreciate it. It helps the show, helps our numbers. And of course if it's on YouTube that you enjoyed the show, please like and subscribe. There's the one little extra step there. I'm sure you don't mind, but thank you everyone who supports the show. Oh one other thing, people speaking to people supporting the show. I did see some people in the chat room that I want to make sure that we acknowledge who I am. And Thras in the chat room says yay, good morning Hello.

57:34 Speaker 1: We've had them on the show many times. Of course, I also saw Larry from Loud Entertainment was in there earlier. Who else did I see? Be Pinard says good morning everyone, Hello to our friend b Pinard. Let's see. I thought I saw somebody else in there too that I wanted to mention. Isaac Banks in the chat room. Oh, Awaiting Abigail our friends Awaiting Abigail a great band from Texas. We have featured on the show so many times and I got to go see them live during the winter. Great band love Awaiting Abigail.

58:05 Speaker 1: Eric Gagnan EASYG is in the chatroom as well. Hello, Eric, and I just want to make sure we don't miss anybody in there. I kind of feel like you might remember Romper Room, the show Romper Room, the kids show. At the end of every episode, she would look into the magic mirror and she would say hello to everybody, and she would just list off a random, you know, random batch of names. But when she said when whenever she said I see Matthew, I would get very excited. I was like asking my mom, how can she see me?

58:32 Speaker 1: Of course I knew better, but did I really Maybe I was just a dumb kid. I don't know. I do want to end with one more track from Low Sunday from their EP, The Black EP. I have become an instant fan of these guys. They are so so good. What did we play already? We played This is not having your so Wired and shattered? Let's play I think we should play someone to Talk To. I really love these guys. They have such a cool sound. Call it shoegaze, call it dark wave, call it whatever you want, but their music is almost hypnotic, speaking of which you can book a hypnotherapy session with me.

59:05 Speaker 1: Go to mattconnorton dot com. You can book that right. Online consultation is always free. We will end the show with this again, thank you so much everybody for joining us. And here it is. This is someone to talk to from Low Sunday to close out this week's Matt Connorton on Leash. I'll talk to y'all a little bit later Bye, everybody.