The Great AI Hypocrisy: While You Yelled at Indies, The Major Labels Built the Death Star
While the anti-AI mob has been busy flooding independent creators' comment sections with "soulless trash" and "thief," the music industry titans were busy doing something else.
They were signing checks.
This week, the news dropped that KLAY Vision—a new AI music technology company—closed licensing deals with Universal Music Group, Sony Music Entertainment, and Warner Music Group.
Read that again. The "Big Three." The gatekeepers. The establishment.
They aren't suing AI into oblivion. They are buying the keys to the castle.
The "Wrong Enemy" Narrative
Here is the Ground Truth that the haters refuse to see: You are fighting the wrong enemy.
The anger toward AI music has been entirely misdirected at small creators, hobbyists, and independent labs like JG BeatsLab. We are accused of "killing music" because we use Suno or Udio to create independent art.
But while you were typing angry tweets at a kid in his bedroom for using AI, the major labels were building their moat.
The major labels aren't "protecting artists" from AI. They are ensuring that they are the ones who control the generator.
The Napster Lesson: Embrace, Extend, Extinguish
The industry learned its lesson from Napster. They know they can't sue technology out of existence.
So, they are taking a page out of the old Microsoft playbook: Embrace, Extend, Extinguish.
By partnering with companies like KLAY (and previously Udio), they are bringing the technology "inside the tent." They will train these models on their vast catalogs—catalogs they own the rights to, often paying the original artists pennies on the dollar.
They aren't doing this to help human musicians. They are doing this to lower their overhead.
The Death of the Sync Market
Here is the nightmare scenario that nobody is talking about: Commercial Sync Licensing.
Right now, independent artists survive by getting their songs placed in commercials, TV shows, and movies. It’s a vital income stream.
In the near future? That revenue stream is gone.
Why would a major label pay an outside independent artist $10,000 for a track to put in a car commercial when their in-house "AI Department" can generate a legally cleared, perfectly mixed track in 30 seconds for a cost of $0.00?
They won't.
They will fill their catalogs with in-house, AI-generated assets. They will create "Virtual Artists" that don't get drunk, don't demand better contracts, and don't need tour buses. (Just look at the ABBA hologram residency in London—it’s a printing press for money).
The Independent's Only Hope
The irony is thick.
The anti-AI crowd screams that AI is "stealing from artists." Yet, by attacking independent AI users, they are inadvertently doing the PR work for the major labels.
The reality is that Independent AI is the only counter-balance to Corporate AI.
The fight isn't "Human vs. AI." The fight is exactly what it has always been: The Independent Creator vs. The Big Business Machine.
If you are an independent artist and you are refusing to learn these tools because of "moral superiority," you are bringing a knife to a nuclear war. The majors are arming themselves. You should be too.
The writing is on the wall. The majors are building the Death Star. Are you going to keep yelling at the rebels, or are you going to learn how to fly the X-Wing?
