Electronic music pioneer Jean-Michel Jarre has called for a new copyright model for generative AI, arguing that creative industries must stop treating artists as data suppliers and recognise them as full commercial partners.
Jean-Michel Jarre is perplexed at the creative industries' Luddite attitude to AI. Arguing that all technology is neutral until charged by human action, the electronic music pioneer claims AI is not a threat, or at least not only a threat.
"It can be one, especially regarding intellectual property, but above all, for me it's the equivalent of a collaborator, a muse and an assistant," he said at the recent World AI Film Festival (WAIFF) of which he is an ambassador. "AI can expand the boundaries of my imagination. That's why I advocate so strongly for making people understand that we must not confuse the tool with its use. A paintbrush is neutral; it's the person holding it who decides. And with AI, it's exactly the same thing."
The Oxygène composer, now 77, has been using AI to create music and visuals for his concerts for a decade and prefers to think of AI as "augmented imagination".
He expanded on this theme at WAIFF in Cannes, where his wife, the actor Gong Li, was president of the film festival.
"Ideas for a script or a film or music often appear mysteriously, from within us. But in reality our subconscious harvests from our analog 'big data,' which is our memory, our culture, our environment, our family, even our children. All of that, gathered randomly, produces an idea. AI is not a category of creation in itself. It is simply an augmented way of using that source of inspiration."
In which case, he acknowledged, all artists are thieves. "I steal everything I hear, everything I see, everything I watch. That's what shapes an artist's identity."
Emotion in art comes from disobeying the rules, he suggested. "Think of the greatest performers: Édith Piaf, David Bowie, Ray Charles. They often sing slightly out of tune or off the beat. That tiny deviation is what gives you goosebumps. It's the creative power of disobedience."
By extension, he argued that creators can use AI to bend the rules. "Trying to extract something unexpected from it is our specificity. It allows us to give something back to [the machine] that is human and creative."
The role of the creator becomes that of a curator of their own ideas, he contended. "Instead of choosing one path at a time, AI offers multiple possibilities simultaneously, which we can sort, combine, and prioritize. That fundamentally changes the creative process."
Jarre claimed that music and cinema industries had grown conservative out of fear of innovation.
"Everyone stays in their lane and fears what might disturb them, which is paradoxical for creative work," he said. "When photography appeared, painters petitioned to have it banned, saying it would be the end of painting. When cinema appeared, it was seen as a threat to theater.
"When I started in electronic music, I introduced it at the Paris Opera [in 1971], and the orchestra musicians unplugged the sound system in protest, saying electronic music would be the end of orchestras.
"I remember when people said synthesizers were cold and clinical and could never create music as well as acoustic instruments. But we forget the essential point that it's not the orchestra or the tool that creates emotion.
"It's because we have invented the violin that Vivaldi existed. It's because we invented electricity that we had Jimi Hendrix. And it's because we are inventing a new learning AI model that new forms of art will be created in the future."
He was dismissive of the hyperbole around copyright theft, saying that piracy has existed since the time of Rembrandt and Vermeer.
"We must not confuse the misuse of a tool with the tool itself. Fraudulent use of AI does not mean AI itself should be questioned.
"If you ask me whether the next Gainsbourg, or the next Tarantino is in danger, I would say no. What differentiates AI from an artist is that an artist transforms the past into something individual and unique. That cannot be replicated."
On the other hand, Jarre, a former president of CISAC (the International Confederation of Societies of Authors and Composers), called for regulation and artist remuneration.
"The value of generative AI companies today relies largely on human-created content. So at some point, we must stop being treated merely as data suppliers and instead become full commercial partners," he said.
The need to establish rules for AI is urgent, he added. "We need to bring together cinema, music, books, video games, literature, journalism and reach global agreements. I don't believe we can apply traditional copyright philosophy anymore, simply because most algorithms can no longer identify the exact origin of their sources. It will be difficult to demand traditional copyright remuneration. We need a new model. That's the challenge."
Characterizing AI's current state as a "Wild West", Jarre said rules would enable greater freedom, not weaken it. "The difference between chaos and democracy is precisely rules."
"AI means democratization. Just as music production became accessible from a bedroom twenty years ago, AI will allow people to make films at low cost. This will have a profound impact on emerging countries. Many young creators in Africa, Asia, and elsewhere struggle to produce work; soon they will be able to do so almost independently. That changes everything."
"And if tomorrow an AI‑generated work produces emotion, then perfect — that's great. As long as intellectual property issues are resolved, there is no problem."
Provocatively, WAIFF was held in Cannes and in the same Palais des Festivals just a few weeks before the auteur-led 79th Cannes Film Festival. Jarre thinks one will soon eclipse the other.
"What we are witnessing here is the equivalent of the Lumière brothers' Arrival of a Train at La Ciotat. Cannes began modestly with just a handful of people 79 years ago. WAIFF will take far less time to become a major global reference."