Matt Connarton Unleashed: Celine Dion vs. AI

0:00 Speaker 1: We've been talking a lot about AI on the show.

0:02 Speaker 2: Last week, we did we did our experiment with Souno

0:07 Speaker 2: dot com where we made some tracks, and apparently it

0:12 Speaker 2: is even easier than I could have imagined.

0:14 Speaker 3: Too easy, stupid easy. Yeah, like really really too easy.

0:20 Speaker 3: If you didn't hear the show last week, seriously, go

0:22 Speaker 3: back and listen to it. Yeah, we didn't give it

0:24 Speaker 3: a ton, just some basic info and it actually spit

0:28 Speaker 3: out some decent music. And it's concerning because how do

0:35 Speaker 3: you know that's AI? Right, Like, you need AI to

0:38 Speaker 3: find out that it's AI, and then what music did

0:43 Speaker 3: they use to learn that? You're right? Yeah, nothing coming

0:46 Speaker 3: out of AI. Didn't have a human On the other end,

0:49 Speaker 3: they're they're taking all of the art, all of the

0:52 Speaker 3: creations from music genres across the spectrum, from artists everywhere,

0:57 Speaker 3: throwing that in a computer and having it spit It's

1:01 Speaker 3: to me, it's still using other people's work. So that's

1:06 Speaker 3: my my. There has to be a way to tell

1:09 Speaker 3: the difference between real human creativity and AI.

1:15 Speaker 2: Yeah, if you go back and listen to last week's show,

1:17 Speaker 2: you can check out some of the tracks that we created,

1:20 Speaker 2: just with a simple prompt and what it was able

1:22 Speaker 2: to spit out. Suno dot Com is a service and

1:25 Speaker 2: they're actually they're free. The free version of the service

1:28 Speaker 2: is pretty generous. They give you, you know, you can make

1:31 Speaker 2: ten songs a month, which might not sound like a lot,

1:33 Speaker 2: but some of these services, you know, they they try

1:36 Speaker 2: to get you into a free trial and get you

1:38 Speaker 2: hooked on it so then you'll be willing to pay

1:41 Speaker 2: for it every month.

1:41 Speaker 1: But what Suno does is.

1:42 Speaker 2: The free option that they offer is actually pretty good.

1:47 Speaker 2: But if you want to hear, so you can hear.

1:49 Speaker 2: What we did live on the air was something we'd

1:52 Speaker 2: wanted to get to for a while, just kind of

1:54 Speaker 2: an experiment of creating tracks using one of these AI services,

1:57 Speaker 2: and we created several and and of course I did

2:01 Speaker 2: put the the mc hammer distracts because of course my

2:04 Speaker 2: long running feud with mc hammer going back six years now,

2:08 Speaker 2: long time listeners, we'll know the six years now. Yes

2:12 Speaker 2: we did, uh, I did the po. We ended up

2:15 Speaker 2: making four distracts using Souno dot com and I did

2:18 Speaker 2: post them all on YouTube as well, so in your

2:21 Speaker 2: face Hammer, it's yeah, that's right.

2:25 Speaker 3: So people did an article recently about Celine Dion uh huh,

2:31 Speaker 3: So the AI is crossing all gendres as far as

2:34 Speaker 3: what it's doing. But apparently Selene Dion did an Instagram

2:38 Speaker 3: post this past Friday. Just yesterday calling out AI and

2:45 Speaker 3: saying that her voice has been allegedly used in an

2:49 Speaker 3: unsanctioned way that she did not approve of. That it

2:54 Speaker 3: sounds like it's her giving a performance, But it's not

2:57 Speaker 3: pretty upsetting when you can consider the fact that, I mean,

3:00 Speaker 3: for one thing, she's an amazing artist, but this woman

3:03 Speaker 3: is going through enough right now without this on top

3:07 Speaker 3: of it all. I mean, look, can we just say that,

3:10 Speaker 3: because I'm really this upset me to see, of all people,

3:14 Speaker 3: you've got to go after somebody who's literally fighting for

3:18 Speaker 3: their life. That's pretty down and low and disgusting if

3:22 Speaker 3: you ask me, but to quota it said, It has

3:25 Speaker 3: come to our attention that unsanctioned AI generated music purporting

3:30 Speaker 3: to contain Celine Dion's musical performances and names and likenesses

3:36 Speaker 3: excuse me and name and Likeness is currently circulating online

3:39 Speaker 3: and across various digital service providers. Please be advised that

3:44 Speaker 3: these recordings are fake and not approved, and are not

3:48 Speaker 3: songs from her official discography.

3:50 Speaker 2: So we should clarify this because I think I understand

3:55 Speaker 2: you know, I only had a chance to glance at

3:57 Speaker 2: this before, but I so because my first thought was, well,

4:00 Speaker 2: how do you prove that her copyrighted work has been

4:04 Speaker 2: used to train these AI models? And then I realized

4:06 Speaker 2: that's not exactly what's happening here, right, people are creating

4:09 Speaker 2: AI versions and claiming it is her.

4:11 Speaker 1: Yes, okay, yeah, this.

4:12 Speaker 3: Is actually they're putting stuff out saying it's her, yeah,

4:15 Speaker 3: and it's it's not by any you know, so this

4:18 Speaker 3: so she just got blindsided by this.

4:20 Speaker 2: Well you know what this reminds me of. And this

4:22 Speaker 2: was over a year ago, I think now that we

4:24 Speaker 2: talked about it, somebody created on YouTube they posted an

4:27 Speaker 2: AI version of a brand new George Carlin album. Yes,

4:32 Speaker 2: remember we talked about that, and and that was interesting.

4:35 Speaker 2: We actually played a little bit of it. We played

4:37 Speaker 2: the very beginning of it on the show because I'd

4:39 Speaker 2: already listened to it, so I knew where the first

4:41 Speaker 2: swear was, so I knew how far, how far into

4:43 Speaker 2: it I could play because I wanted to give people

4:45 Speaker 2: an idea of what it sounded like and very real sound.

4:47 Speaker 2: It did sound very real, and not only that, I

4:50 Speaker 2: ended up listening to the entire hour. It actually was

4:53 Speaker 2: funny too, Like it wasn't like, okay, it sounded like

4:57 Speaker 2: his voice, but the jokes were really lame. Like I

5:00 Speaker 2: actually laughed listening to that special Which is part of

5:04 Speaker 2: why some people at the time were a little bit

5:07 Speaker 2: skeptical and probably still are that because the people who

5:11 Speaker 2: created it claimed that it was entirely AI generated, but

5:14 Speaker 2: some people listened to it and said, hmm, yeah, the

5:17 Speaker 2: voice maybe, but some of those jokes, there's no way

5:20 Speaker 2: those were written by AI. Those were inserted by who

5:22 Speaker 2: ever made it, but who knows. But yeah, you can make.

5:24 Speaker 3: Very realistic That's something that anybody can really say.

5:27 Speaker 1: Yeah, but you can make very realistic work with it.

5:31 Speaker 3: That's smart of what you give it. So if you

5:33 Speaker 3: fed everything to it of George Carlin, I actually don't

5:37 Speaker 3: doubt that it could write George Carlin jokes because it

5:39 Speaker 3: would have learned from that. You know, it's a computer.

5:42 Speaker 3: What you feed it, Yeah, right, all the bigga ones

5:45 Speaker 3: and zeros.

5:46 Speaker 2: But humor is Humor is different though. That's why I'm

5:49 Speaker 2: also I'm one of the people who is skeptical but

5:51 Speaker 2: who knows.

5:52 Speaker 1: We'll probably never know the truth.

5:53 Speaker 3: I got you, Yeah, but I mean in April of

5:56 Speaker 3: last year, there were over two hundred artists that got

5:59 Speaker 3: together and created an Artist Writes Alliance, and they sign letters.

6:04 Speaker 3: And we're trying to get people to pay attention in

6:09 Speaker 3: saying that you know that they want they want laws

6:12 Speaker 3: to protect them, and they want AI developers to have

6:16 Speaker 3: some freaking morals, I think, and not steal from them,

6:20 Speaker 3: because it really is. It's stealing somebody else's are you're

6:23 Speaker 3: stealing theon Celene Dion's voice. That's so wrong. It's more

6:31 Speaker 3: wrong by because of who they chose to pick on

6:33 Speaker 3: as somebody who's literally fighting for their If you don't know,

6:36 Speaker 3: Selene Dion has what's called stiff person syndrome. That's why

6:40 Speaker 3: she can't perform anymore. It only does so on very

6:43 Speaker 3: very rare occasions. It's extraordinarily painful. She suffers immense, just

6:49 Speaker 3: chronic every day suffering that you cannot even imagine. And

6:53 Speaker 3: that's who they pick. They steal her voice, put music

6:55 Speaker 3: out there, claim it's her trying to make money off

6:57 Speaker 3: of her.

6:58 Speaker 2: Well, also want to make a clear distinction in here

7:00 Speaker 2: again going back to what's really happening in this instance,

7:03 Speaker 2: because you know, we've had a lot of conversations about uh,

7:07 Speaker 2: generative AI, these large learning models. You know, they suck

7:11 Speaker 2: up all this information and all this art, all this

7:14 Speaker 2: creativity and then spit out what they spit out. And

7:16 Speaker 2: we've we've had conversations debating about whether that's okay or not.

7:20 Speaker 2: But this is different in that this because this is

7:24 Speaker 2: not there's no there's no ambiguity here, because this is

7:27 Speaker 2: fraud if you're creating something, because you can take the

7:31 Speaker 2: AI completely out of it. Let's let's say it's just

7:34 Speaker 2: somebody who does a really good impression of Selene Deon

7:38 Speaker 2: recording a song and then claiming that it is Selene Deon.

7:42 Speaker 1: That's out that's outright fraud.

7:43 Speaker 2: If you create something and then and then and you

7:46 Speaker 2: claim it's something that it's not, that's that's fraud. That

7:49 Speaker 2: is there's no ambiguity there.

7:51 Speaker 3: But the only differences in this instance, because it's AI,

7:55 Speaker 3: they can make it sound just like her. It's not

7:58 Speaker 3: just kind of like it's just like you know, because

8:01 Speaker 3: computers can imitate everything, right, and these and what the

8:04 Speaker 3: Artist Rights Alliance is trying to do is protect each other.

8:08 Speaker 3: So when I'm talking about over two hundred, like really

8:10 Speaker 3: big names signed onto this, like Billie Irish and and

8:14 Speaker 3: She's imagine dragons, Sheryl Crow, Stevie Wonder, a whole lot

8:20 Speaker 3: of people, and they they're from their perspective. And I

8:24 Speaker 3: want to give this quote because I think it's a

8:26 Speaker 3: great quote. They said quote, Unfortunately, some platforms and developers

8:31 Speaker 3: are employing AI to sabotage creativity and undermined artists, songwriters,

8:37 Speaker 3: musicians and rights holders. And I think that that's a

8:40 Speaker 3: very very perfect statement. It is sabotaging their creativity. It's

8:45 Speaker 3: theft and fraud to steal somebody else's labors turn it

8:49 Speaker 3: into whatever you want to turn it into. You know

8:52 Speaker 3: that it's and you know what, Artists have enough problems

8:56 Speaker 3: these days making money off their own music. I mean

9:00 Speaker 3: talk about that before. What they make less than what

9:03 Speaker 3: is it.

9:05 Speaker 1: Whatever Spotify off right, Yeah, it's not even.

9:10 Speaker 3: In the old days, you printed an album you made

9:12 Speaker 3: your money off of in part apples sales, album sales,

9:15 Speaker 3: and then touring. These days you're making more of your

9:19 Speaker 3: money off of touring because you can't make as much

9:21 Speaker 3: money off of album sales.

9:23 Speaker 2: Although although what a lot of people don't realize is

9:26 Speaker 2: it's kind of it's it's it's uh. In terms of

9:31 Speaker 2: trying to earn revenue from streaming, it's kind of a

9:33 Speaker 2: worse version of what was already the model, in the

9:36 Speaker 2: sense that you never really made that.

9:39 Speaker 1: Much off of album sales. This is something people don't know.

9:43 Speaker 2: And I've given this example before, but I remember when

9:47 Speaker 2: I was a kid when I first started to realize,

9:49 Speaker 2: because I was fascinated by all you know, all this stuff.

9:51 Speaker 2: When I mean AI, we didn't have yet. But when

9:53 Speaker 2: I was a kid, I was always very interested in

9:54 Speaker 2: the music industry and how it works. And I remember

9:57 Speaker 2: reading an interview with meat Loaf and he was talking

9:59 Speaker 2: about Back Out of Hell and of course, which by

10:01 Speaker 2: now is probably sold and it might be it may

10:03 Speaker 2: have surpassed one hundred million at this point, but he

10:07 Speaker 2: was talking about how he didn't really make that much money,

10:09 Speaker 2: like he said, you know, he got like a quarter

10:12 Speaker 2: a quarter, like twenty five cents a quarter per unit sold.

10:15 Speaker 1: Wow, you know, And but that's that's not unusual.

10:19 Speaker 3: Although music didn't get in music how to be transferred

10:22 Speaker 3: from one person or another in an album. Yeah, for

10:24 Speaker 3: at a cassette. You couldn't just electronically, but it.

10:27 Speaker 2: Wasn't but it wasn't as much. That's why I like

10:30 Speaker 2: sometimes every once in a while you'll hear very successful.

10:32 Speaker 2: I remember Kurt Cobain, you know, uh, of course he

10:35 Speaker 2: took himself away from us very young. But I remember

10:38 Speaker 2: when Nirvana first got really big. He made he made

10:40 Speaker 2: a comment in an interview about you know, people think

10:42 Speaker 2: because we're famous, we're rich, and it's it doesn't work

10:45 Speaker 2: that way. He said, you'd be surprised how broke we are.

10:49 Speaker 2: And TLC we've talked about that a great example. They

10:51 Speaker 2: were triple platinum and broke. The money has always been

10:55 Speaker 2: in touring, the big money, and now even touring is

10:58 Speaker 2: is as that has become more cost prohibitive. Now the

11:01 Speaker 2: money really is in merch and and of course licensing.

11:03 Speaker 2: You know, if you license your music, say to a

11:06 Speaker 2: for a film or a TV series or something, then

11:09 Speaker 2: you can make a lot of money. There's always been

11:10 Speaker 2: a lot of money in licensing and that persists.

11:13 Speaker 3: But whatny do you think they make in licensing, Like

11:15 Speaker 3: when you're a venue having a license to be able

11:19 Speaker 3: to have an artist come in and play certain songs

11:22 Speaker 3: venues can't have can only have certain music that they're

11:25 Speaker 3: license for. Do they get the artists make money off

11:28 Speaker 3: of that or are you really something that Well, yeah,

11:30 Speaker 3: it doesn't get them much.

11:31 Speaker 1: It doesn't get them much.

11:33 Speaker 2: I mean those performing rights organizations like as CAP and BMI. Yeah,

11:38 Speaker 2: they're supposed to make sure that you get paid. But

11:42 Speaker 2: but but for that it's it's yeah, we're not we're

11:44 Speaker 2: talking about yeah, Spotify money.

11:46 Speaker 3: The bottom line, it's really hard for artists to be

11:48 Speaker 3: able to make money. So they have AI ripping off

11:51 Speaker 3: artists voices or you know, creating songs that they didn't

11:54 Speaker 3: even sing. Yeah, this is this is not good and

11:58 Speaker 3: I I mean, I do believe and I do agree

12:01 Speaker 3: with that. I do believe that it does. They are

12:03 Speaker 3: correct in saying it's sabotage and creativity. It's stealing creativity.

12:08 Speaker 3: It's stealing the life's blood of an artist. You know,

12:11 Speaker 3: whatever I put on a piece of canvas came out

12:14 Speaker 3: of my me, right.

12:16 Speaker 1: I wouldn't you know what I mean?

12:18 Speaker 3: You think about when I think about it that way,

12:20 Speaker 3: it's like a musician's song is their baby, that's their soul.

12:25 Speaker 3: You know what it actually brings up is. I know

12:27 Speaker 3: it's slightly off, but when with Wren the artist, Wren

12:31 Speaker 3: the rapper Rent he used a piece of music, he

12:33 Speaker 3: spent like tune of dollars to buy it, and Kujo

12:38 Speaker 3: another rapper or something had ownership over that piece, and

12:43 Speaker 3: when he saw Wren made so much money, he went

12:45 Speaker 3: and tried to sue him for it.

12:46 Speaker 2: Yeah, what a Yeah, we never really talked about it

12:49 Speaker 2: on the show, but yeah, that turned into quite a mess.

12:51 Speaker 3: Oh but the But if you want to hear a

12:54 Speaker 3: really great disk track, you got to listen to Wren's

12:56 Speaker 3: disk track on Kuja.

12:57 Speaker 2: But that wasn't even even an AI situation. It was

13:00 Speaker 2: over a sample was created.

13:03 Speaker 3: Yeah, this was trying and in in the disk track

13:07 Speaker 3: and what he would say and what Ren would say

13:08 Speaker 3: off airs. He's trying to steal my creativity. He's trying

13:12 Speaker 3: to steal my creat That song was so personable and

13:16 Speaker 3: so much of his own soul and life blood in there.

13:19 Speaker 3: To have somebody come along and say that's not your creativity,

13:22 Speaker 3: it's mine. From this two second whatever that he bought

13:26 Speaker 3: and paid for to use this it's just a sound bite,

13:28 Speaker 3: it's just a clip, not the whole song. It didn't,

13:31 Speaker 3: you know, it's nothing like that. It's just a particular

13:34 Speaker 3: looping sound. Yeah, And he bought and paid for it correctly.

13:38 Speaker 3: And this guy, you know, I want money, right, I

13:41 Speaker 3: see you making money. I want that money. Trying but

13:44 Speaker 3: he Wren said the same thing. You're trying to steal

13:47 Speaker 3: my creativity, my creation, and that it so if you

13:52 Speaker 3: look at it in all these different situations, it's it is.

13:55 Speaker 3: It's stealing the very soul, lifeblood of an artist.

13:58 Speaker 1: Yeah,