YouTube has launched the YouTube Music AI Incubator program with artists, songwriters and producers from Universal Music Group, which supported the creation of three music principles based on generative artificial intelligence (GAI).

The program combines some of today’s most innovative artists, songwriters, and producers to help inform YouTube’s approach to GAI in music. The incubator will kick off with a genre-spanning cohort of creatives from Universal Music Group that includes Anitta, Björn Ulvaeus, d4vd, Don Was, Juanes, Louis Bell, Max Richter, Rodney Jerkins, Rosanne Cash, Ryan Tedder, Yo Gotti, and the Estate of Frank Sinatra, among others. 

Universal Music Group Chairman and CEO Sir Lucian Grainge helped shape the principles. He shared his vision for an artist’s approach to AI and how partnering with YouTube would best position the music industry for success as the technology continues to develop.

“We are working hand-in-hand with YouTube to launch their Music AI Incubator, which is first bringing together a working group of leading UMG artists, songwriters and producers in multiple genres,” Grainge wrote in a blog post, emphasizing that “from Mozart to The Beatles to Taylor Swift, genius is never random.”

The challenge and opportunity for the industry is to create effective tools, incentives, rewards, and rules. Those rules aim to limit AI’s potential downside while creating a promising upside.

“If we strike the right balance, I believe AI will amplify human imagination and enrich musical creativity in extraordinary new ways,” he wrote. 

The commitment to collaborate and form the three principles was also embraced by YouTube CEO Neal Mohan.

Mohan shared the AI music principles and his vision for how the framework will enhance creative expression and protect artists on the platform.

“As generative AI unlocks ambitious new forms of creativity, YouTube and our partners across the music industry agree to build on our long collaborative history and responsibly embrace this rapidly advancing field,” Mohan wrote in a blog post. “Our goal is to partner with the music industry to empower creativity in a way that enhances our joint pursuit of responsible innovation.

The three principles include: 

• Principle #1: AI is here, and YouTube will embrace it responsibly with its music partners. As GAI unlocks ambitious new forms of creativity, YouTube and our partners across the music industry agree to build on our long collaborative history and responsibly embrace this rapidly advancing field.  YouTube’s goal is to partner with the music industry to empower creativity in a way that enhances our joint pursuit of responsible innovation. 
   
• Principle #2: AI is ushering in a new age of creative expression, but it must include appropriate protections and unlock opportunities for music partners who decide to participate. YouTube will continue to protect the creative work of artists on its platform. The company made massive investments over the years in the systems that help balance the interests of copyright holders with those of the creative community on YouTube. 

• Principle #3: YouTube built an industry based on trust, safety organization and content policies. The goal is to scale those to meet the challenges of AI. Investments in these policies help protect the YouTube community. YouTube will applying these safeguards to AI-generated content. 

YouTube has launched the YouTube Music AI Incubator program with artists, songwriters and producers from Universal Music Group, which helped create three music principles based on AI.