{"id":6893,"date":"2025-07-14T21:24:31","date_gmt":"2025-07-14T21:24:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/what-book-copyright-rulings-mean-for-music-lawsuits\/"},"modified":"2025-07-14T21:24:31","modified_gmt":"2025-07-14T21:24:31","slug":"what-book-copyright-rulings-mean-for-music-lawsuits","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/what-book-copyright-rulings-mean-for-music-lawsuits\/","title":{"rendered":"What Book Copyright Rulings Mean for Music Lawsuits"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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\n\tT<\/span>wo recent court decisions struck a blow for book authors suing generative AI platforms on copyright grounds, with judges concluding that training large language models (LLM) on unlicensed books is \u201ctransformative\u201d and thus constitutes \u201cfair use.\u201d While that left many to question whether music companies\u2019 own infringement lawsuits are similarly doomed, legal experts say it\u2019s far from clear that this same reasoning will apply to the music industry \u2014 and the rulings might even provide a roadmap for the labels and music publishers to strengthen their cases.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe court opinions on book copyrights \u2014 by two California federal judges who used different reasoning, but arrived at the same conclusion, to end authors\u2019 claims against Anthropic and Meta \u2014 sent shockwaves among stakeholders in the debate over generative AI, since they were the first to rule on the issue of fair use. They also seemed to bode poorly for the labels and music publishers suing Anthropic and the AI platforms Suno and Udio for training their models on unlicensed songs and lyrics. But people shouldn\u2019t assume that this means it\u2019s game over for every copyright case against an AI platform.<\/p>\n

\n\tFirst off, these rulings are not the final word on fair use, as there are more than 40 pending lawsuits where judges will consider the same questions about AI. And district court rulings are not precedent; these cases will be appealed to circuit courts around the country, and the Supreme Court will likely weigh in on the matter at some point.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tEven more critically for those in the music industry, it\u2019s key to remember that both the rulings that have come out so far concern books. Experts tell Billboard<\/em> that the medium matters, and legal analysis may be different when it comes to music. \u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cIt\u2019s one thing to come to a conclusion when you\u2019re talking about books,\u201d says Ken Anderson<\/strong>, an entertainment attorney at the law firm Rimon PC. \u201cThere\u2019s a difference when it comes to music and visual arts, which are way, way, way more complicated in analysis than literary works.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tChristopher Ford<\/strong>, an intellectual property litigator at the firm Debevoise and Plimpton, says one major factor that could be different for music is the so-called \u201cmarket impact.\u201d While both the fair use rulings in June found that there wasn\u2019t evidence of LLMs producing books that could directly compete with human authors, Ford notes that AI bands like The Velvet Sundown are getting serious airtime these days.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThat\u2019s incredible evidence,\u201d says Ford. \u201cWe have songs from a completely AI-generated band now taking up spots on Spotify playlists. There\u2019s only so much time a person can spend listening, and every minute that someone is listening to AI-generated bands, they\u2019re not listening to a human artist\u2019s original work.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tThe other key caveat with the June fair use opinions is that those cases challenged only the copyright implications of inputting unlicensed works into AI models for training, not the outputs of these models \u2014 for example, a book or piece of music generated by an AI model. Indeed, both rulings were careful to note that the analysis could be very different if a copyright holder were to claim infringement based on outputs.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tDebevoise intellectual property lawyer Megan Bannigan <\/strong>tells Billboard <\/em>that music labels and publishers have a real shot at pleading that AI from companies like Anthropic, Suno and Udio are spitting out infringing music.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cIt really remains to be seen how the courts are going to analyze fair use for outputs when what is coming out is clearly a song that is protected by copyright,\u201d Bannigan says.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tAll this means that the first fair use rulings are hardly a death knell for the labels and music publishers. As Anderson puts it, \u201cIf I were an AI company that was applying this for musical purposes, I would certainly not consider a fair use opinion on text uses to give me a green light.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tIn fact, these decisions might actually provide a useful roadmap for the music companies as they look to fine-tune their cases and target the right evidence through the discovery process.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThese are some of the older cases,\u201d says Ford of the June opinions. \u201cSo we\u2019re seeing the plaintiffs\u2019 attorneys learn the lessons of prior cases that have come before them as they\u2019re doing more sophisticated pleadings, more sophisticated discovery tactics, more sophisticated expert analyses and more sophisticated arguments.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tAnd while there have been some licensing talks that could lead to deals between the labels and Suno and Udio, experts think it\u2019s unlikely that the decisions that have come out so far will tip the scales in the direction of a settlement.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThese aren\u2019t the kind of resounding wins for the defendants that I think would lead people to say, \u2018Litigation isn\u2019t worth it,\u2019\u201d explains Ford. Bannigan agrees.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cIt\u2019s always possible that a case will settle, but I think especially with respect to the platforms, they\u2019re really fighting to prove that what they\u2019re doing is fair use,\u201d says Bannigan. \u201cSo I wouldn\u2019t expect big settlements coming out of this.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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