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 Hey everyone. I'm Drex Sand. This is the UN Fake Podcast. Kinda my little side journey, my little side hustle as I go, exploring the world of synthetic media and deep fakes and how it's done, and the good and the bad, and the ugly stories of how this new synthetic media space can be useful. But also how it can be used to trick you.

And I think you're gonna love today's story. Oh, and by the way, this is really me, uh, the real and true drex. There will be future episodes where the host might look like me and sound like me, but it won't be me. And just know that right now. I'll always tell you if I ever do that. But in this moment, this is the Real me.

Today's show is about a band, a musical band called The Velvet Sundown, who recently released a couple of albums and almost immediately topped the Spotify charts. They're kind of a groovy sixties folk rock sound that a lot of people, when they heard it kind of fell in love with. But after topping the charts, it was revealed that the band was synthetic.

The voice is fake. The music fake, the instruments fake, all computer generated. And this has created a real controversy about what's art and is this art and was I tricked into liking this fake band? And should I feel weird if I still like this music, what are we gonna do about this stuff? And that's kind of the whole point of un fake.

But since you know now. This is all on fake, so I'm gonna hand it off to my synthetic co-host now to do the un fake deep dive. And by the way, the two voices you're about to hear, also completely fake, fake people talking about a very real story. And I'll tell you more about how I created my synthetic co-host, and I'll give you the links to the stories they reference.

And I'll even point you to a place where you can hear the music. From the velvet sundown, all of that. When we're done, meet me right here in about six minutes and I'll take you backstage. Welcome to the Deep Dive. Today we're digging in something pretty fascinating. Really, it's this whole intersection of, uh, music tech and what authentic even means anymore.

Absolutely. We've got sources talking about a band that topped the charts, but was actually well entirely AI generated. Right. And then how big platforms like YouTube are trying to figure out how to handle all this synthetic media. Mm. So our mission today is to unpack that what's it mean for creators, for us listeners, and you know, the future of content online.

We're talking uk, Sweden. Norway. Wow. Yeah. And they quickly racked up like 1.1 million monthly listeners. People were hooked on this sound. Okay. So everyone thinks it's this amazing retro find. And then, and then comes the reveal. It was, uh. Basically an elaborate art hoax. A hoax, seriously, kind of the people behind it admitted the music was made using ai.

They called it a quote, synthetic music project, guided by human creative direction, guided by humans. Okay, so what was the point? They said it was meant to be a mirror, you know, an ongoing artistic provocation, basically to mess with our ideas about art. And who makes it? Huh? Were there clues apparently?

Yeah. If you looked really closely at their AI generated images, you might spot weird things. Mm-hmm. Like, uh, fused fingers or a sleeve kind of merging into microphone wire, little AI giveaways. That's wild. The glitches. Giving it away. So not quite perfect, but good enough to fool millions at first. How did fans react when they found out?

Oh, it was really divided. Lots of listeners. Maybe surprisingly just kept listening, really even knowing it was ai. Yeah. There's this story about a yoga teacher in Oklahoma, Byron Demarce. He said he still uses one of their songs, drift Beyond the Flame in his classes. Why? He just felt it had the right vibe, the right emotional tone for stretching.

For him. The music worked. You know, it felt good. Didn't matter how it was made. Interesting. But not everyone felt that way. Definitely not. You had people like Stu Cook, the bassist from Credence, Clearwater Revival, a real sixties band who just called the whole thing boring. Ouch. So from genuine enjoyment to outright dismissal, it really shows how personal this stuff is.

Okay, inauthentic. So does that mean no AI tools allowed if you want to make money? No, not exactly. It's not a total ban on using ai. It's more about reinforcing their existing policy, demanding original, and authentic content. They're aiming this squarely at what people are calling AI slop. AI slop, right?

The low effort, spammy stuff. Exactly stuff that's just churned out. Maybe using the same template over and over with no real human touch. YouTube wants to keep the platform valuable for actual creators and well for advertisers too. So what specifically makes something inauthentic enough to get demonetized then?

What are the red flags? Well, they give examples. Things like factory made videos, content, just reusing identical templates without adding anything new, like commentary or education. Mm-hmm. Also, content made entirely by ai. Using text to video or AI visuals. AI scripts with basically no significant human editing or creative input that's out.

And for music like the Velvet Sundown, a key example they give is just having a static image with an AI generated audio track playing that kind of thing is likely going to be demonetized. Okay, so how can creators use AI tools and still, you know, make a living on YouTube? What's the green light look like?

The magic phrase seems to be meaningful Human input. That's the key. Meaningful human input. Like what? Like adding your own original commentary, personal stories, thoughtful edits, maybe showing behind the scenes footage or having a narrative that explains how you used AI in your creative process.

Transparency helps. Uh, okay, so it's about the human layer on top, and they also have to disclose it, right? Yeah. That's another piece, right? Creators need to label realistic looking content if it's been altered or synthetically generated. It's about transparency for the viewers. This whole conversation, you know about what's real, what's valuable online.

It leads to bigger questions, doesn't it? About. AI's role overall. It really does. And you see this kind of ethical split in how AI is being developed and used. How so? Well, you have YouTube focusing on creative integrity, trying to keep things somewhat human-centric on their platform. But then look at Spotify's, CEO, Daniel Eck, his investment firm, put money into Helsing.

Helsing. What's that? It's a defense tech company. They specialize in using AI for military applications. Wow, okay. That's quite a contrast. It is, it throws that question into sharp relief. Hmm. Is AI fundamentally a tool for creativity or is it becoming a tool for conflict? Hmm. Or both, obviously, but where's the emphasis heading?

Yeah, that's heavy stuff. Ultimately, it feels like AI is this incredibly powerful tool. It can create things that genuinely move. Or fool us, like with velvet Sundown. Mm-hmm. But that human element, the creativity, the authenticity, the meaningful input YouTube talks about that still feels like the real value, the currency.

It's not about ditching the tools, maybe, but about valuing the human using them. Well put. Hmm. Which leads to a thought. Maybe for everyone listening to mul over. Yeah. As this technology keeps getting better, right. Blurring these lines even more between what's human made and what's synthetic. Mm-hmm. How will you personally decide what's authentic?

How will you value it in the art and media you consume? And what job do platforms have in, I guess, guiding or policing that distinction? Mm-hmm. What do you think that's, it's crazy, right? So welcome to backstage. Uh, let me tell you how the show came together today. I leveraged, it's a tool that I've used before because I like it and because it's pretty easy to use, which is good for me.

The tools from Google and it's called Notebook lm, I'm probably gonna use this tool over and over and over again 'cause I've kind of, I have a little, have a little bit of a crush on it. So for this episode, I gave Notebook LM two stories to reference. And these were real stories, as I've sort of said already from real reporters.

I put those into the system just by cutting and pasting the URL links to those stories. And then I gave notebook LM some very minor style direction. And what came out was the six minute podcast, like conversation between the two fake non-people, the man and the woman that you just heard. Again, those voices were synthetic, fake people, but the stories are real and.

That's how I did it. And that's it for today's show. I'm Drex the Real and True Drex, and I'll see you soon with more on the good and the bad and the ugly stories of synthetic media and how it can be useful, and how it can be used to trick you. And remember, always the tech itself isn't good or bad. It's about the creator's intention.

Thanks for listening to this edition of Un Fake, part of the unh, the podcast series.