An alleged scammer has been arrested under suspicion that he used AI to create a wild number of fake bands — and fake music to go with them — and faking untold streams with more bots to earn millions in ill-gotten revenue.
In a press release, the Department of Justice announced that investigators have arrested 52-year-old North Carolina man Michael Smith, who has been charged with a purportedly seven-year scheme that involved using his real-life music skills to make more than $10 million in royalties.
Indicted on three counts involving money laundering and wire fraud, the Charlotte-area man faces a maximum of 20 years per charge.
Government when the elites use loopholes and do devious shit:
I sleep
Government when the peasants use loopholes:
Straight to jail
Fyi Spotify has been doing stuff like this for years, hire dirt cheap artists, make up a fake artist/band name, upload generic jingles and implant them on every single category playlist they can. Prime example are playlists for things that don’t have too much complexity like lo-fi, calm piano, stuff like that. Disgusting. Edit: u can spot them out by digging thru some of the “artists”, and when u find one with fishy profile try looking them up on other platforms. Millions of plays on Spotify but nearly nonexistent outside of it? That’s a plant😂
How would that benefit Spotify if they are the ones paying the royalties to themselves? Wouldn’t that be net zero?
Take it this way, if 1 person pays 10$ a month for Spotify and gets about 50 hours of music out of it, it’s more beneficial for Spotify if a significant portion of that time is spent on music they pump into the playlists themselves, which costed them pennies to make, instead of having that user listen to real artists, that will ask for actual pay in exchange for their streams. They’re not paying a little bit to make alot, they’re paying a little bit to avoid paying even more. It’s basically average desk job employee outsourcing their work to indians who get like a dollar a day and are happy with it cus it’s their only option
They don’t pay equally to everyone. They benefit large artists more than smaller ones. If you only listen to your totally unknown friend’s music on Spotify, most of your money will still go to popular artists you don’t listen to, and your friend will get nothing because they’re below the threshold of getting a payment. It’s basically theft. Now if some of those popular artists are Spotify themselves behind the scenes, guess where your money is being funneled.
Probably they find net zero (minus cost of hiring musicians) preferred over paying out a moderate income to actual artists. Capitalism at its finest.
Not that it justifies what Spotify are doing, but the terms they have with the big record companies make it virtually impossible for them to increase their margins through other means. They lose $500m a year as it is.
i understand entirely, it just felt like a good opportunity to say how spotify is trying to enlarge their size of the moneypie by eating out of hardworking musician’s cut and simultaneously filling user’s playlists with bloat
I don’t think it’s Spotify. Spotify already gets their cut, they have no reason to put out “fake music”. This is a very well known “passive income” scheme. It’s obviously real people doing it
Sounds like they are just pissed that he found a way to beat them at their own game.
Nothing wrong with what the man did
They’re just jealous they didn’t get a cut
The advertisers who spent 10m usd on fake “customers” disagree…
Yeah I have no sympathy for advertisers, but this seems like it’s pretty clearly fraud.
Fuck 'em
Is stealing okey just when you steal from others, or are you also okey with others stealing from you?
It’s okay when you hurt rich people and corporations
Where do we draw the line for “rich people?” You can’t just have a system where you can hurt and steal as much as you want from rich people. What you’re describing is closer to a revolution, and carrying that idea to its conclusion usually involves a ton of bloodshed and putting new people in power who are just as bad.
You’re right, because they shouldn’t exist at all. No rich people, no need to draw a line. Thanks for making this so simple!
No rich people, no need to draw a line.
If you want to deny rich people existence, you have to define what rich means, so there is pretty clear need to draw a line.
See, you cant even deliver your stupid thiefy argument correctly.
Thanks for making this so simple!
They didn’t make it simple, they just showed you that you are so simple that you can’t comprehend any kind of at least slightly complex topic.
Don’t worry about it, go back to your young communist lego or something.
Where do you live and how much money do you have? If you have more than me by any chance, I would like to steal some from you, I hope that ok with you.
That is not okay with me and is not a contradiction either. I am nowhere near rich. Are you getting paid to deepthroat the boot or do you just enjoy it?
I am nowhere near rich.
You have the internet and some kind of computer, which means you are more rich than lot of other people on earth. Does that mean all of them can steal from you, because you are rich? Or are you just a piece of shit trying to justify why it is ok for you to steal, hoping for protection from others at the same time?
Are you getting paid to deepthroat the boot or do you just enjoy it?
I am just teasing idiots for fun. But if you knew someone who would pay for this, don’t hesitate to let me know.
Am i supposed to feel sorry for poor ol’ RIAA being ripped off? 'Cos i’m not.
But when corporations do this, they are praised for brilliant innovative fiduciary prowess. 🙄
What a smart use of the system. too bad for him.
So OpenAI is revolutionary but this guys a criminal? wtf?!
The main difference is who your mates are.
Isn’t that all that Facebook and Twitter is though?
Thank God the government is here to protect us from dangerous people like this man. /s
Hey can I do this but just enough to feed my family and keep my house ? I don’t need 10 million 100k a year would do just fine for me !
Every day the Butlerian Jihad looks more and more enticing.
