EDITOR'S NOTE
Not-So-Sweet Music
by Brandi Scardilli
 AI is permeating all aspects of our world, so much so that the topic even dovetails with Phil Shapiro’s lead feature about music tools librarians should know about (page 19). Back in the ’90s, Natalie Cole sang a Grammy-winning duet with her late father Nat King Cole. At the 2018 Super Bowl, Justin Timberlake courted controversy when he dueted with a video projection of Prince. These reincarnations—two of many examples—were singing existing songs, but now with AI, they can be made to sing or say anything. For every James Earl Jones, who signed off on Lucasfilm’s use of AI to give posthumous voice to Darth Vader, there’s a Robin Williams, whose daughter has criticized AI resurrecting his voice without his ability to consent. How should we treat someone’s digital right to be dead? Kashyap Kompella gets into the weeds of the ethical and legal implications of an AI-created afterlife on page 21.
More takes on AI include We the People (page 9), which explores how AI can help libraries as long as they’re aware of its downsides, and the Insights on Content feature (page 26), which imagines an AI utopia at a university press where AI’s problems have been ethically resolved. There’s also plenty in this issue that’s not AI-related.
Happy reading,
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