{"type":"rich","version":"1.0","provider_name":"Transistor","provider_url":"https://transistor.fm","author_name":"The Co-Write Room: AI, Music, and the Future of Everything Creative","title":"Ain't Nothing The Real Thing","html":"","width":"100%","height":180,"duration":393,"description":"What if the song that went viral last week was purchased? And what if the royalties you didn't earn from it were stolen on top of that? In Episode 9, Raia Kumar tracks four stories — manufactured virality, the first federal AI streaming fraud conviction, a billion-dollar funding round mid-lawsuit, and a landmark bill that could finally give independent songwriters a legal seat at the table.\nIn this episode:Labels are paying regular people around forty dollars per one hundred views to create short-form videos using specific tracks — manufacturing what the algorithm reads as organic momentum. Trevor Noah said it out loud. The industry has known for years.\nMichael Smith, 54, of North Carolina pleaded guilty on March 19, 2026 to using AI to generate hundreds of thousands of songs and bots to fake billions of streams — collecting over ten million dollars in royalties that belonged to working musicians. He is the first person in American history convicted of a federal crime for AI-assisted music streaming fraud. The key legal distinction: the crime wasn't AI music. The crime was manufacturing the audience.\nSuno closed a four hundred million dollar funding round this week — valuation five point four billion dollars, more than double seven months ago — while actively being sued by major labels for copyright infringement. Their new AI model is \"built in partnership with the music industry,\" which turns out to mean a deal with Warner Music Group. One major label. Not independent songwriters.\nWithin 72 hours of each other, Suno and Udio filed nearly identical motions to seal the same piece of information in their separate federal cases: the total number of audio files each company used to train their AI. The argument is trade secret protection. The effect, if granted, is that the most important number in determining the scope of copyright damages may be permanently hidden.\nOn June 1, the Artists Rights Alliance launched a national campaign behind the Protect Working...","thumbnail_url":"https://img.transistorcdn.com/2e1aXrIs_UQ-ZqdngjxutRu3tw6-V_JumEmWPYxqKVw/rs:fill:0:0:1/w:400/h:400/q:60/mb:500000/aHR0cHM6Ly9pbWct/dXBsb2FkLXByb2R1/Y3Rpb24udHJhbnNp/c3Rvci5mbS9kMGVm/ZDcxZTBiZGUxOGJj/ODgwNmY4MWU4NGRj/NzM1ZS5wbmc.webp","thumbnail_width":300,"thumbnail_height":300}