Twitter has been sued for US$250 million for “rampant copyright infringement” of music
Elon Musk has a new headache. So has Linda Yaccarino, the new Twitter CEO.
Seventeen different entities, including Sony Music Publishing, Universal Music Publishing Group and Warner Chappell Music, have filed a US$250 million suit in Tennessee alleging copyright infringement of approximately 1,700 musical works. The complaint read like this:
“Twitter fuels its business with countless infringing copies of musical compositions, violating Publishers’ and others’ exclusive rights under copyright law.
“While numerous Twitter competitors respect the need for proper licenses and agreements for the use of musical compositions on their platforms, Twitter does not, and instead breeds massive copyright infringement that harms music creators.”
The only defendant is X Corp, Musk’s company and the one that owns Twitter.
Unlike other social media platforms like TikTok and Facebook, Twitter has no music licensing agreements in place. This has been a bone of contention for years. Meanwhile, it’s alleged, that Twitter allowed all kinds of infringement to happen.
This is a statement from David Israelite, CEO of the National Music Publishers’ Association (NMPA): “Twitter knows full well that music is leaked, launched, and streamed by billions of people every day on its platform. No longer can it hide behind the DMCA and refuse to pay songwriters and music publishers.”
The other complainants are some really heavy-hitters:
- Concord
- Universal Music Publishing Group
- peermusic
- ABKCO Music
- Anthem Entertainment
- Big Machine Music
- BMG Rights Management
- Hipgnosis Songs Group
- Kobalt Music Publishing America,
- Mayimba Music
- Reservoir Media Management
- Sony Music Publishing
- Spirit Music Group
- The Royalty Network
- Ultra Music Publishing
- Warner Chappell Music
- Wixen Music Publishing.
There’s more at MBW.
