Spend some time watching your favorite artists on YouTube Music and you’ll probably come across a song by them that you’ve never even heard of.
And usually this music discovery experience feels amazing. But it definitely feels a little deflating whenever that song is a new tune an AI tool cooked up in a few minutes. Then there is the presence of original songs by AI artists that sound incredibly real (with some of them even climbing the Billboard music charts!).
Fortunately, there has been a concerted effort by popular music streaming services to combat the rise of songs born through generative AI. Now YouTube Music has joined that crusade by creating a new system that makes users more aware of AI songs.
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Here’s a quick breakdown of how that system works, along with an overview of all the other music streaming services that have announced and implemented their own defenses against AI-generated music.
A new label that makes it clear that AI was involved in the music process
The official YouTube blog announced its implementation of a new system that places distinctive labels on the player page for a track where AI played a major role in its creation.
So, in any case where a song contains a composition or vocal track that was clearly created by generative AI, that label will appear. Clicking on it will bring users to a menu that gives more details about the AI track, should you be more interested in learning about its origin.
YouTube stated that it has been working with several music partners to properly set up its new AI-generated music identifiers and labels. And while the new feature won’t outright ban AI music from YouTube Music, it will still serve as a strong transparency measure for everyday listeners.
In addition to YouTube Music, a number of other music platforms have installed their own measures against AI music. Global digital music streaming platform Deezer stands out for being the first of its kind to create an AI music tagging system. Alexis Lanternier, the CEO of Deezer, talked about maintaining a level of trust with their listeners and streaming artists by using this detection method.
“AI is not inherently good or bad, but we believe that a responsible and transparent approach is key to building trust with our users and the music industry,” he said. “We are also clear in our commitment to protect the rights of artists and songwriters at a time when copyright law is being questioned for the training of AI models.”
Bandcamp has gone the furthest in its approach by completely excluding all music and audio that was created entirely or substantially with the use of AI. Any use of AI tools to imitate other artists or styles is strictly prohibited in accordance with our existing policies prohibiting impersonation and intellectual property infringement,” the online music distribution platform continued.
TIDAL has chosen to cut off the monetization of AI music altogether, plus Apple Music has introduced “AI Transparency Tags” for AI tunes (for which record labels and music distributors are responsible, as they must submit the tags to Apple for proper labeling). Spotify has gone a long way to protect its listeners from the annoyance of AI music with its systems, which led to the streaming company deleting more than 75 million tracks that were labeled as AI spam.
Last but certainly not least, Qobuz must also be praised for its AI music recognition system and its decision to retain the loyalties of artists with fraudulent streaming patterns.
The takeaway
YouTube Music’s concerted efforts to make listeners aware of the AI music they encounter are necessary at a time when generative AI is being used to flood streaming services with obvious (and not-so-obvious) audio slop.
Just take a look at this survey conducted by LANDR and you will get a clearer picture of how many artists use AI in their music process. Seeing 66% of surveyed artists using AI for “creative tasks” is definitely surprising to read (and disappointing).
Anyway, it’s just good to know that YouTube Music and companies like it are going the extra mile to flag AI music or block it completely from their music libraries.
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