"The AI Music Flood: Industry Shifts Gears to Profit from Synthetic Sounds"
In 2023, the music industry's worst nightmare came true. A convincingly fake duet between Drake and The Weeknd, titled "Heart on My Sleeve," racked up millions of streams before anyone could explain its origin. The track didn't just go viral â it broke the illusion that anyone was in control. With no way to stop the onslaught of AI-generated music, the industry is taking a different approach: figuring out how to make money off of it. In this new landscape, detection systems are being embedded across the entire music pipeline to identify synthetic content, tag it with metadata, and govern how it moves through the system.
The goal isn't takedowns, but licensing and control. Startups are now popping up to build detection into licensing workflows, while platforms like YouTube and Deezer have developed internal systems to flag synthetic audio as it's uploaded. Companies like Audible Magic, Pex, Rightsify, and SoundCloud are expanding detection, moderation, and attribution features across everything from training datasets to distribution. A new category of infrastructure is quietly taking shape, built not to stop generative music outright, but to make it traceable. Detection systems are being embedded in the tools used to train models, the platforms where songs are uploaded, the databases that license rights, and the algorithms that shape discovery.
The ease with which AI tools churn out content has inadvertently created fertile ground for sophisticated streaming scams, leaving detection infrastructure scrambling to keep up. Boomy, a platform launched in 2019 that allows users to generate and release AI-created music, found itself linked to a major alleged fraud operation, highlighting the tension between enabling creativity and preventing misuse. In September 2024, a federal investigation revealed a connection between Boomy's leadership and producer Michael Smith, who was indicted for allegedly orchestrating a streaming fraud scheme exceeding $10 million. Boomy CEO Alex Mitchell was listed as a co-writer on hundreds of the thousands of songs allegedly used in the scheme. The indictment detailed Smith's alleged use of "as many as 10,000 active Bot accounts" to inflate streams for music generated via Boomy.
The music industry's response to AI-generated music marks a significant shift from enforcement to infrastructure. By building detection systems into the music pipeline, the industry hopes to turn a potential threat into a lucrative opportunity. As the ecosystem of companies treating the detection of AI-generated content as table-stakes infrastructure continues to grow, one thing is clear: the future of music is synthetic, and the industry is betting on it. In this new landscape, the question is no longer how to stop AI music, but how to make money from it. With detection systems in place, the industry can now focus on licensing and controlling synthetic content, opening up new revenue streams and business models. As the music industry navigates this uncharted territory, one thing is certain â the sound of the future is being written in code.