• Join Puck

    Directly Supporting Authors

    A new economic model in which writers are also partners in the business.

    Personalized Subscriptions

    Customize your settings to receive the newsletters you want from the authors you follow.

    Stay in the Know

    Connect directly with Puck talent through email and exclusive events.

  • What is puck? Newsletters Authors Podcasts Events Gift Puck Careers

The Record Industry’s Full-Blown A.I. War

A pair of well-capitalized A.I. music startups have found themselves in the middle of a gnarly lawsuit against the industry’s biggest labels in a case that may set precedents across numerous creative industries. These suits will either be remembered as a power play, or a devastating blow to their own assets and their relevance to artists.

taylor swift
If copyright laws accommodate Taylor Swift’s re-creation and release of songs that are nearly identical to the originals, how can a record label protest A.I. software that churns out pop star-esque tunes? Photo: Buda Mendes/TAS23/Getty Images for TAS Rights Management
Eriq Gardner
August 7, 2024

Join Puck to listen to this article

Just a few days ago, amid a barrage of lawsuits sweeping through the generative A.I. sector, a pair of music A.I. startups, Suno and Udio, found themselves facing massive copyright infringement claims from heavyweight record labels, including Universal, Sony, and Warner. The plaintiffs’ claims are somewhat straightforward: They argue that “synthetic musical outputs could saturate the market” and “directly compete with, cheapen, and ultimately drown out the genuine sound recordings.”