Want to Get Off Your Phone? "I think that's been the most helpful thing," says the ESPN journalist. "So there you go, Zoomers. There's a reason to have children." I just got it replaced because I cracked the screen with my car. I was resting it on the roof and it slid down as I was opening the trunk, and it was a real crime scene. When you bring a cracked phone to an Apple store, you know that they've seen everything, but you still feel deeply ashamed.

Mashable's Best: E-readers, robovacs, laptops, earbuds, smart home and more Look Up Creator Playbook Mashable Voices Trending Now Say More Mashable Selects Safety Net Versus Gift Ideas For Everyone On Your List Switch Off In My Bag All Series Is this the next big thing in music? Phone-free concerts and Spotify's events are giving young fans an increasingly rare opportunity to connect in person. Olivia Tauber is the deputy editor of digital culture, covering creators, media, movies, beauty, and more. Based in New York, her work has appeared in The New York Times, Vanity Fair, The Cut, Teen Vogue, Complex, and Interview Magazine. She holds a Master's degree in Journalism from NYU and a Bachelor's from the University of Michigan.

It's no secret that Spotify is the dominant player in the music streaming market, with 293 million paid subscribers and 761 million monthly active users across both paid and free tiers. Along with massive market dominance has come a fair bit of controversy in recent years. As the biggest music-streaming platform, Spotify is usually the first mentioned in the discussion about whether artists are fairly compensated for their work. The math around that question is obvious -- buying a digital album outright typically costs between 10 and 15 depending on where you buy it, while a Spotify Premium subscription costs 13 a month in the US. Fair pay is far from the only drama surrounding Spotify, though.

Spotify has been teasing its upcoming AI tool that lets fans make covers and remixes for a while now, even unveiling a partnership with Universal Music Group. The streamer just announced another partner for the endeavor, the indie music publishing company Kobalt. This company publishes songs by a wide range of musicians, from Phoebe Bridgers to the post-punk outfit IDLES. Kobalt artists will soon be able to opt-in to Spotify's upcoming platform that lets fans repurpose songs to make remixes and covers. This is, of course, done via a suite of AI tools.

Image caption, The changes are being introduced to give listeners more transparency about what they're hearing, Spotify says Spotify is introducing a new feature that will highlight if an artist has been generated by artificial intelligence (AI). The streaming service says the AI Persona badge, that will start appearing on some profiles from mid-September, will flag to listeners if an artist's identity may be AI-generated and does not represent a real person. The changes are being introduced to give listeners more transparency about what they're hearing, Spotify says. It comes after some music fans made it clear to the streamer they don't like seeing a profile that seems to be a human, to then realise it's AI-generated. AI-generated music has long been a concern for users of the platform.

Mashable's Best: E-readers, robovacs, laptops, earbuds, smart home and more Look Up Say More Creator Hub Gift Ideas For Everyone On Your List Mashable Selects Versus Switch Off Trending Now Safety Net In My Bag VidCon with Mashable All Series Spotify will now tell you when an artist isn't real The new AI Persona badge will flag synthetic artist identities and keep their music out of recommendations by default. Olivia Tauber is the deputy editor of digital culture, covering creators, media, movies, beauty, and more. Based in New York, her work has appeared in The New York Times, Vanity Fair, The Cut, Teen Vogue, Complex, and Interview Magazine. She holds a Master's degree in Journalism from NYU and a Bachelor's from the University of Michigan. She also runs Fan Mail, a weekly pop-culture newsletter.

AI-generated artists will be labelled as an'AI persona' on their profile, in search and in track listings. AI-generated artists will be labelled as an'AI persona' on their profile, in search and in track listings. Music streaming platform creates'AI persona' label that will appear on profiles and track listings in crackdown on fake performers Spotify is to label AI artists and exclude them from algorithm recommendations as part of a crackdown on fake performers. The world's largest music streaming platform is creating a label for AI-generated artist identities called "AI personas" that will appear on the artist profile and on track listings on playlists. It means that from next month AI-generated artists such as the Velvet Sundown will carry the persona label and will be blocked from personalised recommendations by default.

Spotify announced that it will begin labeling certain artist accounts that aren't real people. The new AI Persona badge will add a level of transparency to music profiles that present themselves as human despite being generative AI creations. Accounts can declare themselves to be AI Personas beginning August 11 via the Spotify for Artists portal. Spotify will also use a mix of human checks and AI-powered reviews to apply a Likely AI Persona badge to artists it believes aren't real. The account is will be alerted if the tag is applied, and artists will have an appeal process if they receive the badge erroneously.

Look Up Total Solar Eclipse 2024 Mashable Selects Say More Versus Creator Hub Switch Off Mashable's Best: E-readers, robovacs, laptops, earbuds, smart home and more Trending Now Safety Net In My Bag VidCon with Mashable All Series The audio giant says the feature, which lets some users bypass non-Spotify ads, is still in early testing as publishers push back. Chance Townsend is the General Assignments Editor at Mashable, covering tech, video games, dating apps, digital culture, and whatever else comes his way. He has a Master's in Journalism from the University of North Texas and is a proud orange cat father. His writing has also appeared in PC Mag and . Spotify has rolled out a feature that lets some users skip past podcast ads not sold directly by the platform, per an exclusive report from Semafor .

A recent update made video playback the default for songs and podcasts with a visual component. If you just want to listen to music--and save your data and battery--follow these tips. Spotify, it's fair to say, has made some weird user-experience choices. There are a number of panels in the app, and the layout is confusing. The service constantly tracks your activity.