Ed will discuss the issues that arise when generative AI companies scrape training data without consent, and the alternative - licensing training data - that is being embraced by many AI music companies.

Ed Newton-Rex is the founder of Fairly Trained, a non-profit that certifies generative AI companies for fair training data practices. He is also a Visiting Scholar at Stanford University.

In 2010, Ed founded Jukedeck, one of the first AI music generation startups. Jukedeck let video creators generate music for their videos, and was used to create more than a million pieces of music. It was acquired by ByteDance in 2019. At ByteDance, Ed led the AI Music lab, then led Product for TikTok in Europe.

In 2022 Ed joined Stability AI, the company behind Stable Diffusion, to lead their Audio team. His team launched Stable Audio, Stability’s music generation product, which was named one of TIME Magazine’s best inventions of the year in 2023. He resigned from Stability in November 2023 due to the company’s policy of training AI models on copyrighted work without consent, and in 2024 founded Fairly Trained. He is a published composer of choral music.

Using her experience as a dancer, therapist, mediator, diversity trainer, anthropologist, college educator, and originator of Grounded Knowledge Panels®, Valerie Joseph distills lessons learned about the power of intentional and principled listening. She offers ideas on how to harness the energy derived from listening differently to fuel the capacity to have uncomfortable, rich, dynamic and productive thinking. This forms the basis upon which we are challenged to make transformative choices about how we operate with those other humans with whom we share the planet.

Valerie Joseph earned a Ph.D. in Cultural Anthropology from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. Her doctoral research investigated the enduring legacies of British colonialism and African heritage memory among the members of the African Diaspora in Carriacou, Grenada. Specifically, she mapped how the game songs and dance play of Carriacouan Black girls as well as their words, beliefs, and attitudes reflected both the detrimental internalization of colonial ideology and the restorative nature of African retentions.

Prior to her fieldwork in Carriacou, Dr. Joseph lived and worked in Botswana for seven years starting as a Peace Corps Volunteer science teacher in a junior secondary school, then as a training coordinator at the Cheshire Foundation's Mogoditshane Rehabilitation Center. She closed out her years in the country by working as co-director of the School for International Training's college semester abroad program. During her time in Botswana, Dr. Joseph sharpened her interest in cross-cultural conflicts, including those that seemed to be intractable, though traceable, in part, to cultural mores as well as historical and social patterns embedded in racial or ethnic bias and discrimination.

Dr. Joseph has a Masters in Movement Therapy with a concentration in counseling psychology and a Masters in Social Justice Education. Her supplemental training, work and experience in several fields includes gymnastics coaching, dance performance, diversity training, Authentic Movement (a contemplative dance form), mediation, teaching and management in higher education.

Dr. Joseph is an educator-interventionist working at Smith College as the Mentoring Administrative Director for AEMES (Achieving Excellence in Math Engineering and Science). In that role, she manages programs to support the most marginalized students who are pursuing STEM. She also teaches college success seminars within the AEMES Scholars Program.

Dr. Joseph is co-founder of the Smith Roundtable Group. Started in 2020, the SRG is a small contingent of staff, faculty, and students dedicated to creating opportunities for information sharing and conversation about important current events. Past Roundtable offerings included: “Daring to be Hopeful: A Critical Response to the White Supremacist Storming of Our Capitol” and “Why is the Power of Young People so Threatening to the Status Quo?” The most recent Roundtable event took place in September of this year: "'Calling In' for Democracy and Human Rights: A Consideration of Project 2025."

In and outside of Smith, Dr. Joseph convenes a unique form of public discourse that she originated. Grounded Knowledge Panels® are public conversations by small groups of people who have realistic, authentic and personal experience and understanding of a particular topic or question. Emerging from core Black culture, Grounded Knowledge Panels are a synthesis of Dr. Joseph's study and work in various fields including anthropology, Authentic Movement, education and mediation. As panelists converse among themselves, audience members are invited as “witnesses” to observe the discussion. Both groups - panelists and witnesses – bring a distinctive power, depth and responsibility to the experience of speaking and listening.

Dr. Joseph is a five time recipient of the Smith College Spotlight Award, an honor presented to staff members, chosen by peers, in appreciation of exceptional service. She is a 2020 recipient of the Elizabeth B. Wyant Gavel Award awarded by students to staff members who have performed outstanding work in the Smith community.

Dr. Joseph's first children's book, This is What Maisie Believes, is published by 619 Wreath Publishing.