{"id":9773,"date":"2026-02-03T15:27:54","date_gmt":"2026-02-03T15:27:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/pandora-settles-lawsuit-over-robin-williams-george-lopez-comedy-sets\/"},"modified":"2026-02-03T15:27:54","modified_gmt":"2026-02-03T15:27:54","slug":"pandora-settles-lawsuit-over-robin-williams-george-lopez-comedy-sets","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/pandora-settles-lawsuit-over-robin-williams-george-lopez-comedy-sets\/","title":{"rendered":"Pandora Settles Lawsuit Over Robin Williams, George Lopez Comedy Sets"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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\n\tPandora has settled with comedians in a closely-watched legal dispute over spoken-word content licensing, though the streamer says it still isn\u2019t paying the equivalent of publishing royalties sought in the comics\u2019 lawsuit.<\/p>\n

\n\tNine comedians and their heirs, including George Lopez, Lewis Black and the estates of deceased legends Robin Williams and George Carlin, have been fighting since 2022 to increase the royalties paid when their comedy sets are streamed on Pandora. Lawyers for the comics and Pandora agreed on a confidential settlement during a court-refereed mediation on Wednesday (Jan. 28), court records show.<\/p>\n

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\n\tThe comedians\u2019 lawsuit had aimed to align their royalties structure with that of music streaming, where artists are paid for both sound recordings (masters) and the underlying written music (publishing). Comics have historically been paid digital streaming royalties only for their recorded comedy routines, not the underlying jokes themselves.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe comedians did not ultimately achieve this goal, according to a spokesperson for Pandora\u2019s parent company SiriusXM, who said in a statement to Billboard <\/em>on Monday (Feb. 2) that the settlement does not grant the comics either past royalties or forward-looking licenses for spoken-word rights.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cWe at SiriusXM and Pandora are pleased to have resolved this matter amicably, with an outcome that affirms the legality of our long-standing approach to licensing spoken-word comedy recordings,\u201d said the spokesperson. \u201cWe look forward to continuing our mutually beneficial relationship with comedians, using the same licensing practices that have long been standard across streaming services, broadcasters and other platforms that help comedians and spoken-word artists share and promote their work.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\n\tReached for comment on Monday, the comedians\u2019 lawyer, Richard Busch<\/strong>, said only, \u201cWe settled amicably.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThe settlement follows a court report that, while not final, had prognosticated an outcome in favor of Pandora. Former federal magistrate judge Suzanne H. Segal, who was appointed as a so-called special master to weigh in on the case, advised this summer that the comedians gave Pandora an \u201cimplied license\u201d to their written work by allowing the company to stream comedy shows for years without protest.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe lawsuit\u2019s presiding judge, Mark C. Scarsi, was in the process of reviewing this report and had asked for more information before making his own binding judgment. However, the judge suggested this past September that a settlement might be more prudent.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThe court anticipates that further proceedings before the special master will require further significant expenditures by the parties and the special master (whose fees are borne by the parties) given the anticipated scope of the court\u2019s instructions for further development,\u201d wrote Judge Scarsi. \u201cOn that basis, following the policy of this district to encourage disposition of civil litigation by settlement when such is in the best interest of the parties, the court orders the parties to engage in a settlement conference.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Pandora has settled with comedians in a closely-watched legal dispute over spoken-word content licensing, though the streamer says it still isn\u2019t paying the equivalent of publishing royalties sought […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":9774,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[7422,2641,303,6032,7421,2748,2794,322,1258],"class_list":["post-9773","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lawyers","tag-comedy","tag-george","tag-lawsuit","tag-lopez","tag-pandora","tag-robin","tag-sets","tag-settles","tag-williams"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9773","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=9773"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9773\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9774"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9773"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9773"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9773"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}