{"id":8511,"date":"2025-11-12T06:27:58","date_gmt":"2025-11-12T06:27:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/spotify-lawsuit-taylor-swift-trump-tiktok-michael-jackson-music-law\/"},"modified":"2025-11-12T06:27:58","modified_gmt":"2025-11-12T06:27:58","slug":"spotify-lawsuit-taylor-swift-trump-tiktok-michael-jackson-music-law","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/spotify-lawsuit-taylor-swift-trump-tiktok-michael-jackson-music-law\/","title":{"rendered":"Spotify Lawsuit, Taylor Swift Trump TikTok, Michael Jackson: Music Law"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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\n\tTHE BIG STORY: <\/strong>Since subscribing to Spotify in 2023, Genevieve Capolongo says she\u2019s mostly listened to \u201clesser-known artists\u201d like Pr\u00f3xima Parada, Julia Cooper and Brusco. But she says the streamer\u2019s recommendation tools keep serving her \u201cmainstream, major-label tracks\u201d by Drake, Zach Bryan and Justin Bieber.<\/p>\n

\n\tAccording to her lawyers, that\u2019s because Spotify was paid to do so. <\/p>\n

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\n\tIn a lawsuit filed last week, Capolongo claims the streamer\u2019s Discovery Mode and editorial playlists amount to a \u201cmodern form of payola,\u201d allowing labels to secretly boost their tracks with a \u201cdeceptive pay-for-play\u201d program. She says she wouldn\u2019t have subscribed if she knew that Spotify\u2019s recommendations had been sold \u201cto the highest bidder.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThe case is sometimes light on specifics, like citing unnamed \u201cindustry insiders\u201d about alleged illicit payments or \u201cdisproportionate\u201d rates of major-label music. Spotify, for its part, called the lawsuit \u201cnonsense\u201d and said it was \u201criddled with misunderstandings and inaccuracies.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tBut it targets a program that has raised eyebrows for years \u2014 and comes at a time when Spotify has faced multiple accusations about manipulation on the platform. For more, go read our full story here.<\/p>\n

\n\tYou\u2019re reading The Legal Beat, a weekly newsletter about music law from <\/em>Billboard Pro, offering you a one-stop cheat sheet of big new cases, important rulings and all the fun stuff in between. To get the newsletter in your inbox every Tuesday, go subscribe here<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

\n\t\tOther top stories this week\u2026<\/strong>\t<\/h2>\n

\n\tDRAKE\u2019S APPEAL<\/strong> \u2013 As Drake asks an appeals court to revive his lawsuit over Kendrick Lamar\u2019s \u201cNot Like Us,\u201d I asked legal experts what his lawyers might argue \u2014 and whether it\u2019ll work.<\/p>\n

\n\tTAYLOR V. TRUMP? <\/strong>\u2013 Taylor Swift fans want her to sue the Trump administration after it used \u201cThe Fate of Ophelia\u201d in a TikTok video. She probably could, but almost certainly won\u2019t.<\/p>\n

\n\tDISJOINT VENTURE<\/strong> \u2013 10K Projects, the Warner-owned label founded by Elliot Grainge<\/strong>, is facing a lawsuit claiming it owes millions to Taz Taylor<\/strong>\u2019s Internet Money Records under a joint venture.<\/p>\n

\n\tFAST & FREE SONGS<\/strong> \u2013 How did New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani get clearance to use Bob Dylan\u2019s iconic anthem \u201cThe Times They Are A-Changin\u2019\u201d in a campaign ad? It turns out he didn\u2019t.<\/p>\n

\n\tMJ LITIGATION<\/strong> \u2013 Michael Jackson\u2019s estate is locked in a legal battle over abuse allegations from the Cascio siblings, who spent much of their childhoods with the King of Pop.<\/p>\n

\n\tGORDIAN SLIPKNOT <\/strong>\u2013 Slipknot\u2019s lawsuit against a group that has owned slipknot.com for decades has hit an unexpected snag: The shadowy entity has hired a lawyer and is fighting back.<\/p>\n

\n\tATLANTA ARREST<\/strong> \u2013 Rod Wave was arrested in Atlanta on weapon and drug charges. His lawyer \u2014 star defense attorney Drew Findling<\/strong> \u2014 says Wave was \u201cunjustly profiled and unlawfully arrested.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tNAME REVEAL? \u2013 <\/strong>A \u201cJane Roe\u201d woman who accused Garth Brooks of sexual assault is refusing to concede defeat in her fight to remain pseudonymous, filing an appeal to avoid disclosing her real name.<\/p>\n

\n\tNOVEMBER LITIGATION<\/strong> \u2013 An ex-manager of Guns N\u2019 Roses is suing the band, claiming it has unfairly blocked the release of his memoir by threatening to sue him and his publisher over a decades-old NDA.<\/p>\n


\"Billboard
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THE BIG STORY: Since subscribing to Spotify in 2023, Genevieve Capolongo says she\u2019s mostly listened to \u201clesser-known artists\u201d like Pr\u00f3xima Parada, Julia Cooper and Brusco. But she says […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8512,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[1684,153,303,1244,593,1217,3029,3028,182,409],"class_list":["post-8511","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lawyers","tag-jackson","tag-law","tag-lawsuit","tag-michael","tag-music","tag-spotify","tag-swift","tag-taylor","tag-tiktok","tag-trump"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8511","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8511"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8511\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8512"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8511"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8511"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8511"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}