(AllHipHop News) Roc Nation wants everyone to know that you can’t mess with Jay-Z’s image and likeness and get away with it.
A popular company called Vocal Synthesis learned the hard way when they tried to use his face and voice through “deepfake” technology.
The company created clips of “Jay-Z” rapping Billy Joel’s “We Didn’t Start the Fire,” “Book of Genesis” and Hamlet’s “To be or not to be” soliloquy on YouTube.
As brilliant as that was … and most certainly entertaining … using artificial intelligence without permission to create a celebrity performance is super illegal.
The anonymous creator of the videos first reported that Roc Nation was not happy about the copyright infringement infractions and sent the company the following notice: “This content unlawfully uses an AI to impersonate our client’s voice.”
But Vocal Synthesis maintains that the videos are really creative ways to use technology and are fun. In a deepfake video, he or she explains his or her position.
Check out Barack Obama and Donald Trump as they appeal to the public why these videos have “no malicious purpose” and that he or she is “disappointed that Jay-Z and Roc Nation have decided to bully a small YouTuber in this way.”
Even funnier than Jay-Z, Obama and Trump, are the voices of Ronald Reagan, John F. Kennedy, and also Franklin Delano Roosevelt who says “F##ck YouTube and F##k ROC Nation!”
To prove how much they don’t give a f##k about the Roc and YouTube, they posted another Jay-Z video after they took down and reposted the Hamlet and Billy Joel videos.
Jay-Z might mind, but the former president didn’t care when they had him rap Biggie’s “Juicy!” Do you?
