OpenAI’s head of media partnerships has said it does not currently intend to share SearchGPT ad revenue with publishers. But he added that the matter was “an evolving space for us right now” and that it was in OpenAI’s interests to provide enough value to stop publishers opting out of appearing in SearchGPT results.
Source: OpenAI exec rules out sharing revenue from SearchGPT with publishers, for now
On Thursday the company announced it will start rolling out AI-organized search results pages for users in the US. Importantly for both investors and advertisers, Google also said it’s adding ads to its AI-powered AI Overviews in Search, as well as an updated look for AI Overviews that the company says will improve traffic to linked websites.
Source: Google to begin organizing some search results using AI, bringing ads to AI Overviews
Despite decades of infighting and years of false starts, the members of Pink Floyd have agreed to sell music rights to Sony Music for $400 million. The deal apparently has finally concluded despite decades of ongoing infighting and bitter words between the bandmembers, notably chief songwriters Roger Waters and David Gilmour. The deal comprises recorded-music rights but not songwriting, which is held by the individual writers, as well as name-and-likeness, which includes merchandise, theatrical and similar rights.
Source: Pink Floyd Sells Music Rights to Sony for $400 Million
Overall, Q3 2024’s funding was significantly beneath that delivered by Q3 2023, north of $2.56 billion across 30 rounds. The older period’s average round size was $85.43 million, in excess of three times more than the average for 2024’s third quarter. Despite the decrease, Q3 2024 didn’t lack encouraging funding takeaways, including the mentioned strong showing between mid-August and mid-September, TickPick’s noted quarter-billion-dollar raise, and others.
Source: Music Industry Funding Fell in Q3 ’24 Despite Some Positive Signs
A letter sent from Merlin to its members states TikTok has walked away from negotiations with the collective in favor of individual deals. “TikTok has asked us for an ‘orderly transition’ to do direct deals with those members they deem worthy. As you know, Merlin was founded to stand up for and champion its members. We will not support an approach that devalues our community,” the letter continues.
Source: TikTok vs. Merlin: Licensing Impasse Looms for Indie Collective
Informa, the academic publishing powerhouse and parent company of Routledge and Taylor & Francis, recently announced a deal with Microsoft that will feed a massive body of scholarly work to a generative AI system. If Informa’s decision portends a wave of similar deals between scholarly publishers and generative AI companies, the troubling precedent this sets could result in significant changes to the nature of academic publishing.
Source: An author has questions on his publisher’s AI deal (opinion)
YouTube said in a statement published via social media over the weekend its deal with SESAC had “expired without an agreement on renewal conditions despite our best efforts”. That dispute has now been resolved. SESAC said today (September 30) that it has struck a deal with YouTube “to equitably compensate SESAC’s songwriters and publishers for the use of their music”.
Industry groups representing major record companies and streaming platforms have a message for Canada’s telecom regulator: streaming is not radio, and shouldn’t be regulated as if it were. The groups were responding to the CRTC’s recent series of workshops on implementing new rules governing streaming services. Under those rules, streaming services that are not Canadian-owned are required to pay 5% of revenue into funds that subsidize Canadian content and creators.
MBW understands that Hipgnosis plans to reflect the unification of the management company and Hipgnosis’ two formerly separate portfolios (Hipgnosis Songs Fund and Hipgnosis Songs Assets) under a single, new name. Internal discussions on the matter are well underway, we’re told, with an announcement on a new name expected around the turn of the year. “The existing names no longer accurately reflects the structure of the business.”
Runway, the generative AI company that recently inked a first-of-its-kind deal with Lionsgate, will dole out grants of up to $1 million to filmmakers working on AI-powered projects. Runway is launching The Hundred Film Fund, an initiative to help produce and fund as many as 100 short films and feature-length movies that use generative AI technology to tell their stories.