Artists are increasingly concerned about the generally generative use of their image, their voice, and their talent. Hence, at least until , they try to take measures themselves against this emerging technology to protect themselves from its use and abuse. The last to do so has been. The singer has decided to register her voice and image with the United States patent office to try to get ahead of the negative consequences that AI can have for her and her interests.
The 36-year-old Pennsylvania artist has registered three elements: two voice cuts and an image. The clips are just two sentences, with which she presented herself on Spotify and Amazon Music when announcing: “Hey, it’s Taylor Swift” y “Hey, it’s Taylor“. The photograph, for its part, is one of the best-known images of , which lasted 22 months and achieved income of more than 2,000 million dollars. In the image (very similar to the one that heads this article) she is seen posing standing in front of a microphone, with a blue and pink sequined bodysuit, silver boots and a pink guitar in her hand. It is one of those that was used promotionally for
This movement, these small patents, seek to serve as protection for Swift from improper use of its image and voice by AI. For example, a while ago a false advertisement with his image circulated online encouraging people to vote for Donald Trump; It was a lie, since the singer has been reproaching the president’s words and attitudes for years, who . A couple of years ago, in addition, they created deepfakes pornographic nature of the singer Blank Spacewhich even the actors union denounced with “painful and deep concern.”
The clips and images registered under the property of TAS Management – that is the name of one of the companies that manage Swift’s rights and assets – do not have to be used exactly, they do not have to be those specific ones. But the fact that there is a patent with Swift’s voice and clear (and especially representative) image can help prevent artificial intelligence from having it so easy to replicate her characteristics and falsify them, of those specific ones, but also of similar copies or imitations, because the patent also protects that abuse. If someone used Swift’s voice fraudulently, for whatever reason (economic, political, hate…), she could claim ownership of it and stop said replication.
This method, of patenting images and voice cuts, is a new step with which actors and singers try to protect themselves from the multiple and still unexplored paths that AI can take them. One of the first to use it was, a few months ago, Matthew McConaughey. His legal team has tried to carry out a new strategy to try to protect himself, since it is not very common to use patents to protect personal or professional image.
According to the media specialized in entertainment, this step would offer “additional legal resources” that would help “fight against content generated by AI that appropriates the image” of certain people, especially public figures. For example, , which his character, David Wooderson, utters in the film Dazed and Confused (also titled Move of ’76 o Rebellious and confused), directed by Richard Linklater in 1993, and also patented audio and video clips of his.
