Artificial intelligence is pouring into streaming music, forcing Spotify and the wider industry to decide what an artist actually is. But the best defence of human-made music may be the oldest one available: put musicians on a stage in front of an audience.

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There was a time when the basic ingredients of the music business were reasonably easy to identify. Someone wrote a song. Musicians played it live, then, if all goes well, they record it.

Artificial intelligence has started pulling that chain apart.

Spotify is now dealing with music made partly or entirely with generative AI, synthetic voices and artists whose public identities may not represent an actual human being.

The scale has become impossible to dismiss. Spotify says it removed 75 million "spammy tracks" in just 12 months, although not all were AI-generated, as it attempts to stop low-effort material and streaming manipulation swamping legitimate music.

From mid-September, it will go further by adding an AI Persona badge to profiles it believes represent synthetic rather than real artists. Those personas will also be excluded by default from Spotify's editorial and algorithmic recommendations unless listeners actively engage with them.

AI itself is not being banned, it is just being tagged for the consumer to choose. Musicians have always adopted technology, from electric guitars and synthesisers to sampling and digital recording.

Spotify's new AI Credits system can identify where AI has been used for vocals, lyrics, instrumentation or production. But disclosure remains optional, is currently in beta and does not amount to a prominent AI label on every affected track.

Australia has already been dragged into the argument through Josh Fawaz's AI-assisted version of Like a Prayer. The controversy helped prompt the Australian Recording Industry Association (ARIA) this week to rule that music must be "substantially human made" to qualify for its charts and awards.

But perhaps........

© Canberra Times