TIDAL stops paying royalties on fully AI-generated music
· SplitScout · 1 min read
TIDAL published a new AI policy at the end of June, and it has teeth. Starting July 15, any track identified as 100 percent AI-generated stops earning on the platform. No royalties, no direct-to-fan sales. The tracks stay up, but that's it.
The policy has three parts:
Demonetization
Fully AI-generated music can't collect royalties or be sold through TIDAL's direct-to-fan system. TIDAL isn't banning it, it's just not paying for it.
An "AI" badge
Anything that's wholly machine-generated gets a visible AI tag, so listeners know what they're hearing before they press play. TIDAL says it plans to extend the badge to "substantially AI-generated" tracks once detection tools get better.
Impersonation removal
Automated tools will take down AI music that imitates a real artist or group. That part is a removal, not a tag.
Here's the quote worth reading, from TIDAL's Tony Gervino: "We are committed to protecting and rewarding organic creativity to avoid compromising an artist's ability to connect with and build their fandom from TIDAL subscribers."
What this means if you make lofi
If you write, play or produce your music yourself, nothing changes. Using AI somewhere in the process (a mastering assistant, generated artwork, a sample you flipped) does not trigger the policy. It targets tracks that are wholly machine-generated, start to finish.
If anything, this is good news. Streaming royalties come out of a shared pool, and every AI-spam upload that earns a fraction of a cent earns it out of the same pot as your tracks. Fewer paid AI streams means the pool tilts back toward people who actually make music.
One thing to watch: Spotify, Apple Music, Deezer and Qobuz have all been moving in the same direction, so expect "is this AI-generated" to become a standard question. Some labels already ask about it in their demo forms, and more will.
Full policy is at https://tidal.com/ai-policy. Hat tip to the Stereofox Discord, where we first caught the conversation.