Sony hires an executive vice president for artificial intelligence
Sony Music Entertainment has hired Geoff Taylor as vice president in charge of coordinating all AI-related activities at the company
Artificial intelligence is becoming more widespread in a wide variety of industries, including the entertainment industry. It looks like Sony is ready to embrace this technology, as the company’s music division just hired a VP of artificial intelligence. Geoff Taylor, former CEO of the British Phonographic Industry trade organization, will assume this role and report directly to Sony Music Entertainment’s chief operating officer Kevin Kelleher. Variety reported the news of the new appointment, which will apparently include coordination of all activities related to artificial intelligence within the company, as well as coordination with the global digital business and legal affairs divisions. Prior to taking on his role as Sony Music’s executive vice president of artificial intelligence, Taylor primarily fought against piracy and fraud during his tenure at the BPI. With the appointment of an executive role specifically for AI, it seems that Sony Music is certainly ensuring that AI is a viable part of its business in the future looking ahead of the times.
Artificial Intelligence and Music: The Phenomenon of Fan Made Songs
Artificial intelligence has already made its way into the music industry: fans have been using text-to-speech platforms to remake songs with the vocals of their favorite artists. Some prime examples are Kanye West songs redone by Drake and vice versa. Fans have even used these platforms to create brand new songs using the voices of these artists. Obviously, fan-made products cannot be sold for a fee, and there has already been a lot of discussion about the legality of this type of content. Clearly, Sony believes this problem will only become more prevalent as AI becomes increasingly accessible to average consumers. The most significant example is that of the musician Grimes, that he encouraged his fans to use his voice to create songs and that he would split the royalties from those songs 50/50 for each successful song. The open-source platform Grimes has made available, Elf.tech, is trained to mimic his voice and has already resulted in a viral hit with musician Kito’s song “Cold Touch,” which Grimes called a “masterpiece.” Grimes has the rare status of not being signed to a label; therefore, the red tape required to green light something like this is much less complex. which Grimes called a “masterpiece”. Grimes has the rare status of not being signed to a label; therefore, the red tape required to green light something like this is much less complex. which Grimes called a “masterpiece”. Grimes has the rare status of not being signed to a label; therefore, the red tape required to green light something like this is much less complex.
