With the ease at which musicians can not only create and mix, but distribute and self-release their tracks, it’s unsurprising that the quantity of music now being put out into the world is significantly higher than it was a few decades ago. But, when compiling a recent deep-dive feature, we were quite surprised to discover just how big that margin has become
More music released today (in a single day) than in all of calendar year 1989
Agents, Authors Question HarperCollins AI Deal
HarperCollins has become the first Big Five publisher to strike a licensing deal to provide access to select nonfiction books for AI training purposes. And so far, authors and agents appear to be approaching the deal with caution and skepticism—if also with a measure of hope. In a statement, Harper representatives confirmed only that the agreement with an undisclosed company will “allow limited use of select nonfiction backlist titles” for use in training AI models “to improve model quality and performance.”
There’s No Longer Any Doubt That Hollywood Writing Is Powering AI
Dialogue from these movies and TV shows has been used by companies such as Apple and Anthropic to train AI systems. The files within this data set are not scripts, exactly. Rather, they are subtitles taken from a website called OpenSubtitles.org. Users of the site typically extract subtitles from DVDs, Blu-ray discs, and internet streams using optical-character-recognition (OCR) software.
Source: There’s No Longer Any Doubt That Hollywood Writing Is Powering AI
AllTrack — America’s 5th PRO — Opens Mechanical Rights Option
AllTrack, billed as a digital-era performing rights organization (PRO) with a focus on the independent music sector, has announced the launch of a mechanical rights division. According to the company, the move makes AllTrack the first PRO in the United States to offer integrated performance and mechanical rights collection services that music creators and publishers can manage through a single platform.
Source: AllTrack — America’s 5th PRO — Opens Mechanical Rights Option
AI and human writers share stylistic fingerprints
People write with personal style and individual flourishes that set them apart from other writers. So does AI, including top programs like Chat GPT, new Johns Hopkins University-led research finds. A new tool can not only detect writing created by AI, it can predict which large language model created it.
David Attenborough Reacts to AI Replica of His Voice: ‘I Am Profoundly Disturbed’
Sir David Attenborough does not approve of AI being used to replicate his voice, telling BBC News he is ‘profoundly disturbed’ by the technology. “Having spent a lifetime trying to speak what I believe to be the truth, I am profoundly disturbed to find that these days, my identity is being stolen by others and greatly object to them using it to say whatever they wish.”
The metaphors of artificial intelligence
What is the nature of intelligence of LLMs and the artificial intelligence (AI) systems built on them? The disagreements in the AI world on how to think about LLMs are starkly revealed in this diverse array of metaphors. Given our limited understanding of the impressive feats and unpredictable errors of these systems, it has been argued that “metaphors are all we have for the moment to circle that black box.”
The Wall Street Journal is testing AI article summaries
The Wall Street Journal is experimenting with AI-generated article summaries that appear at the top of its news stories. The summaries appear as a “Key Points” box with bullets summarizing the piece. The Verge spotted the test on a story about Trump’s plans for the Department of Education, and the Journal confirmed it’s trialing the feature to see how readers respond.
Source: The Wall Street Journal is testing AI article summaries
Scholarly publishing world slow to embrace generative AI
As the technology’s reach into the information sector expands, a recent report from Ithaka S+R shows that academe is still grappling with how best to integrate it into the scholarly publishing process. “Generative AI has injected a lot of variables into the equation of scholarly publishing. And there’s not yet a shared framework for understanding what those implications are,” said Dylan Ruediger, co-author of the report and a senior program manager of the research enterprise division at Ithaka S+R.
Source: Scholarly publishing world slow to embrace generative AI
Turntable Labs launches Hangout social music service with label deals
Social-music service Hangout has gone live, launched by Turntable Labs – the startup founded by one of the early employees in Turntable·fm, which ignited a big (if ultimately brief) buzz around the category more than a decade ago. All three major labels and Merlin are on board for Hangout’s launch, with the company claiming a library of more than 100m tracks available for its users to DJ with.
Source: Turntable Labs launches Hangout social music service with label deals