Madonna’s newest album release — why do we still call them albums? — MDNA debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard charts. This immediately produced talk of her comeback being a smashing success, signaling a triumphant return.
So why, according to Forbes, have MDNA sales fallen a record 88 percent week-to-week, from 379,000 copies to a mere 46,000?
The answer is actually pretty simple. Madonna packaged the album with ticket sales to her upcoming tour on Ticketmaster. She was basically giving her album away to anyone who bought a ticket. These "sales" were then counted in Billboard's tally.
Once the tour dates sold out, the number of sales stopped.
Now to be fair, she is not the first person to offer this deal. Both Tom Petty and Bon Jovi did this to climb the charts in the past, but you would have thought the Material Girl would be above such trickeration. It’s hard on aging acts to stay relevant. The older audience wants to hear the hits from the past, and the younger generation? Well, they just don’t care.
Madonna will have no trouble selling-out large venues and, no doubt, put on a great show. She’s scheduled to perform four nights at Yankee Stadium in September and two nights at Toyota Center in October.
But, will this tour be enough to breathe life into MDNA, or are the days of owning the charts are behind her?
To help ensure his career is “alright, alright, alright” in the AI era, Oscar-winning movie star Matthew McConaughey has trademarked two of his greatest assets: his face and voice.
Last year, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office issued eight trademarks designed to prevent AI users from mimicking McConaughey’s likeness or voice without authorization. Applications for the trademarks, known as “motion marks” and “sound marks,” include:
A 7-second video of him seated near a fireplace and Christmas tree in his living room.
A 7-second video of him standing on a porch
A brief audio clip of him saying, “Just keep livin’, right?” J.K. Livin Brands, which owns McConaughey’s Just Keep Livin apparel business, controls the trademarks.
A brief audio clip of him uttering his iconic “Alright, alright, alright” catchphrase from the 1993 cult classic film Dazed and Confused.
“My team and I want to know that when my voice or likeness is ever used, it’s because I approved and signed off on it,” McConaughey, a Uvalde native and longtime Austin resident, told The Wall Street Journal. “We want to create a clear perimeter around ownership with consent and attribution the norm in an AI world.”
As AI continues to infiltrate the entertainment business, McConaughey and other Hollywood A-listers are pursuing trademarks to stop AI-driven misuse of their faces and voices. However, everyday actors with limited resources may be unable to afford going through the trademark process and defending a trademark violation.
“Some actors fear a possible future in which studios will pressure them to sign away their likeness,” Scientific American reported in 2023, “and their digital double will take work away from them.”
The Wall Street Journal notes that various actors and singers have grappled with AI-created fake videos, audio, and images on the internet, including Tom Hanks and Taylor Swift. A study released in 2024 by the International Confederation of Societies of Authors and Composers predicted AI-generated content could cause music creators to lose 24 percent of their revenue by 2028, and could lead to screenwriters and directors losing 15-20 percent of their revenue.
The threat of AI stealing work from actors became a sticking point in 2023 negotiations between entertainment studios and striking members of SAG-AFTRA, a labor union representing performers, recording artists, and broadcasters.
Kevin Yorn, founder and managing partner of Southern California law firm Yorn Levine, which handled the trademark applications for McConaughey, says that while the actor and his attorneys support the evolution of AI, legal boundaries must be put in place.
“Protecting individual voice, image, and intellectual property is essential to building a future that works for everyone,” Yorn says in a statement provided to CultureMap. “Along with Matthew, we are forward-looking, engaged in the possibilities of AI, and thoughtful about how everyone’s creative identity is represented and protected.”
