Deezer removes 26 million titles, or 13% of its catalog

Deezer is doing its spring cleaning. The French music streaming platform has announced the deletion of 13% of its catalog of titles, which represents several million songs. The reason: the platform has long been polluted by “white noise”, ambient tracks, “fake albums” or even bad imitations by artificial intelligence.

The volume of this digital “dust” had become notable. These are notably ambiances considered as “white noise” and put online on streaming platforms. They capture significant revenue, harming the real creators.

In response, Deezer carried out a major sweep, with 26 million titles deleted in a few months, or 13% of the catalog. The platform has a total of 150 million titles, adding albums containing only one track, music generated by artificial intelligence or even songs that have not been listened to for a year.

Concerning AI, more than 200 artists, including Billie Eilish, Katy Perry and Nicki Minaj, signed a column on April 1, published on Médium, calling for better protection of the rights of creators. Swedish giant Spotify also removed millions of AI-generated tracks in May.