Submitted 2 weeks ago by Valnao@sh.itjust.works to technology@lemmy.world
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/mar/21/man-pleads-guilty-music-streaming-fraud-ai
The ONLY reason the industry cares is because of the fake streamers part of this. They not only welcome ai music, platforms like Spotify are creating ai music of their own so they can cut out the pittance they pay the artists.
This is not a goodguys-win story.
I feel like I’m missing something in this article. If he was taking the music but also faking the play counts with bots, how were other artists missing out?
The streaming service pays them out of a pool proportionally. So he basically diluted the distribution from that pool, resulting in lower payments to everyone else.
How is that different from Spotify producing their own AI-gen music? Seems like that’s 3-4 minutes of listening that otherwise would’ve been spent listening to an artist.
That would be the missing bit! Cheers
Smith was charged in September 2024 with fraudulently obtaining more than $10m in royalty payments by amassing as many as 661,440 streams daily between 2017 and 2024, yielding annual royalties of $1,027,128.
This already deserves movie adaptation.
Sounds like the botting was the problem, not the AI-generated tracks. He could’ve done the same with sounds of nature or some other shit like that.
Disclaimer: fuck AI.
I don’t get it. Is it illegal to make songs with AI? Shouldn’t they be going after the AI companies?
He was boosting his streams with bots, which is why it’s fraud. By doing this he also tricked the recommendation algorithm to show more of the generated tracks to legit listeners, thereby he removing human listeners from legit artists, hurting their income. (this is also written in the article)
when do the ai owners start paying the damages on stealing content to power the models? it’s kinda the same…
The bots were the real weapon here, but the AI angle points at something worth watching: music streaming platforms rely on the assumption that plays reflect real listeners. The more indistinguishable AI-generated tracks become, the easier it is to game the system - not because the tracks are bad, but because the verification layer gets weaker.
What keeps this system honest now? Mostly good luck and the assumption that most people won’t bother. Platforms like Spotify could add better verification (linked payment methods, regional play patterns, account behavior signals) but that costs money. Easier to just prosecute fraudsters retroactively and call it solved.
Maybe this is why there’s a global push for age verification?
I’m all for this…but why go after a single man who used a tool premade to do the theft, when they could also go after the dozens of AI companies out there that are literally stealing IP to sell to consumers.
While I am not against AI as a tool, this person being a tool with AI generated slop remixes everywhere as a hustle is not approve.
Oh no!
I hope all the details are shared so that we can all carefully avoid doing the same to those music industry bas…s-fishing executives.
Bad bot, go home.
Got greedy
While not being rich enough to have fuck you money and get away with it.
Right. Should gone slower, more secure, settled for a million. Bird in the hand.
db2@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
This is supposed to make me feel sympathetic to the multi billion dollar corporations? Fuck all the way off with that shit.
Kolanaki@pawb.social 2 weeks ago
“Due to lower than expected album sales, James Hetfield has had to settle for a solid gold swimming pool instead of the solid platinum pool he really wanted.”
aceshigh@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Money good. Napster bad.
UniversalBasicJustice@quokk.au 2 weeks ago
#ItShouldHaveBeenLars
realitista@lemmus.org 2 weeks ago
The artists get essentially none of that money, so when they talk about the “music industry” they are talking about all the parasites feeding off them. Rob them for all they are worth.
queermunist@lemmy.ml 2 weeks ago
Let them fight.