Gary Furlong, a Texas-based audiobook narrator, had worried for a while that synthetic voices created by algorithms could steal work from artists like himself. Early this month, he felt his worst fears had been realized, after learning of a clause in contracts between authors and leading audiobook distributor Findaway Voices, which gave Apple the right to “use audiobooks files for machine learning training and models.”
Source: Audiobook Narrators Fear Apple Used Their Voices to Train AI
Following the initial launch, TikTok confirmed to MBW that Believe-owned digital distribution platform TuneCore had been picked as its distribution partner for SoundOn. But now, TikTok has a new distribution partner: Amsterdam-based B2B tech and services company, FUGA, which was acquired by Downtown Music Holdings in January 2020.
Source: TikTok’s SoundOn distribution service is now powered by FUGA
The European Commission issued on Wednesday (15 February) 11 referrals to the EU’s Court of Justice after six member states failed to transpose copyright measures into national law. Approaching one year from this latest initiative, Bulgaria, Denmark, Finland, Latvia, Poland, and Portugal have been referred to the EU Court for failing to notify the Commission of their transposition of the Copyright Directive.
Source: EU Commission sends six states to court for not transposing copyright rules
For those interested in the IP implications of the NFT phenomenon, the jury’s verdict in the Hermes case is a clear rejection of the idea that NFT projects are somehow immune from the same IP rules that other businesses and artists have to follow. It is true that a lot of the commercial hype around NFTs has died down a lot after a disastrous 2022. At the same time, there remains plenty of money invested in the NFT space, and the chances for the sector to get hot again can’t be written off.
Historically, YouTube has struggled to manage its complicated relationship with the recording industry. The platform’s latest product, however, provides creators with an appealing library of songs and clear licensing terms for those tracks. Creator Music, first announced last year, is now available for all YouTube partners in the United States. The new service is separate from the Shorts Music Library, though the launch of Creator Music has been closely tied to the expansion of YouTube Shorts ads.
Source: Creator Music brings “mainstream” tracks to YouTube videos – Tubefilter
The catalog of Death Row Records, which includes canonical rap albums like 2Pac‘s All Eyez On Me and Snoop Dogg‘s Doggystyle, is now available on TikTok. TikTok is touting the exclusive partnership, which launched on Sunday (Feb. 12) and continues for the rest of the week, as the “first-ever catalog reissue to release exclusively through SoundOn,” the distribution and marketing service the company launched in 2022.
Digital transformation has led to a proliferation in the availability of news sources and content for journalists and publishers, as well as the number of middlemen that publishers have to deal with regularly. As a result, publishers must pay more attention to due diligence — ensuring that they understand the relationships between the original copyright owner and any platforms or middlemen they may use.
Source: Digital distribution & lawsuit threats prompt publishers to plan for copyright compliance
After dipping during the great COVID lockdown, media piracy has come roaring back. The proliferation of popular streaming TV content and the return of robust wide-release film slates have helped drive steady increases in illicit viewing since 2020, according to exclusive data from piracy-focused research firm Muso.
Source: Global Content Piracy Soared 18% in 2022 (Exclusive)
The IPO also commissioned independent research on the impacts of three potential legislative interventions on creator remuneration: equitable remuneration, contractual adjustment mechanisms, and rights reversion. The research on contract adjustment mechanisms and rights reversion was published on 6 February 2023. The research on equitable remuneration is at an advanced stage and will be published once it is finalized.
Microsoft l-ast week began testing a new chatbot interface for Bing that can sometimes provide a way to sidestep news websites’ paywalls, providing glossy conversational answers that draw on media content. As Google and others also prepare chatbots, their potential to sap traffic from media companies could add a new twist to their conflicts with tech platforms over how content appears on search engines and social feeds.
Source: News Publishers Are Wary of the Bing Chatbot’s Media Diet