Rapper and actor Tupac Shakur is a revered figure in the world of hip-hop.
Conspiracy theories abound regarding his 1996 murder.
And the science-fiction reason rapper Tupac’s estate is taking legal action against another artist will blow your mind.
Rap beefs are commonplace.
Tupac Shakur famously took issue with rapper The Notorious B.I.G., also known as Biggie Smalls, because Tupac suspected that he was somehow involved the first time the rapper faced a barrage of bullets outside of a New York music studio.
Currently, rap stars Drake and Kendrick Lamar are engulfed in a dispute that has captured a lot of attention in the music industry.
Artificial collaboration
Kendrick Lamar released a diss track aimed at Drake, and he responded with a track that used an AI rendering of Tupac’s voice.
But Tupac Shakur’s estate, which is close with Kendrick Lamar, issued a cease and desist letter to Drake for that reason.
“The unauthorized, equally dismaying use of Tupac’s voice against Kendrick Lamar, a good friend to the Estate who has given nothing but respect to Tupac and his legacy publicly and privately, compounds the insult,” the letter read. “It is hard to believe that [Tupac’s record label]’s intellectual property was not scraped to create the fake Tupac AI on the Record.”
Drake had previously been at the center of an AI music controversy when someone created a fake song some believed was a real collaboration between him and R&B singer The Weeknd.
These problems were easily foreseeable.
“Demonic”
Fellow rapper and actor Ice Cube called the use of AI in music “demonic.”
During a podcast interview, he explained his belief that AI “is demonic.”
“I think there’s gonna be a backlash because of AI” he added. “I think people are gonna want things organic and not artificial.”
One online user pushed back and replied, “Ice Cube, musician who became famous rapping over samples, says AI is ‘demonic.’”
“Samples are approved or denied by the song owners. Totally different than taking a dead artist and making a new song they never approved and saying things they may not agree with. That’s evil and demonic to me.”
That is precisely what happened with Drake.
There are already lawsuits regarding AI and the use of intellectual property without compensation and attribution.
The problem is only going to get worse.
AI is advancing faster than people expected, and not enough consideration has been given to the implications of that.
