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The legal battles surrounding generative AI and copyright continue to escalate with prominent players in the Indian music industry now seeking to join an existing lawsuit against OpenAI, the creator of ChatGPT. On February 13, 2025, industry giants such as Saregama, T-Series, and the Indian Music Industry (IMI) presented their concerns in a New Delhi court, arguing that OpenAI’s methods for training its AI models involve extracting protected song lyrics, music compositions, and recordings without proper licensing or compensation. This development follows a broader trend of copyright holders challenging generative AI companies, as evidenced by similar claims in the U.S. and Europe.Continue Reading Indian Music Industry Enters the Global Copyright Debate Over AI

The U.S. Copyright Office’s January 2025 report on AI and copyrightability reaffirms the longstanding principle that copyright protection is reserved for works of human authorship. Outputs created entirely by generative artificial intelligence (AI), with no human creative input, are not eligible for copyright protection. The Office offers a framework for assessing human authorship for works involving AI, outlining three scenarios: (1) using AI as an assistive tool rather than a replacement for human creativity, (2) incorporating human-created elements into AI-generated output, and (3) creatively arranging or modifying AI-generated elements.Continue Reading The Copyright Office’s Latest Guidance on AI and Copyrightability

Given the introduction of the ‘NO FAKES’ Act by a bi-partisan group of senators within days of U.S. Copyright Office’s release of its digital replicas report asserting an “urgent need” for more cohesive protections at the federal level, it’s clear that momentum is building for federal oversight in the realm of deepfake and digital replication technology. This legislative effort is intertwined with broader national and global discussions about AI’s impact on privacy, intellectual property, and personal identity, alongside existing gaps in enforceable protections.Continue Reading Closer to a Federal Right of Publicity – Senate Introduces NO FAKES Act

Blockchain is a revolutionary technology that has great potential to solve many of the fundamental challenges facing the music industry today. Blockchain technology including distributed, decentralized ledgers, smart contracts, and the ability to tokenize digital assets, is uniquely suited to address issues such as rights management, licensing, copyright ownership, royalty tracking and reporting and the primary and secondary ticketing markets for live events. Various aspects of the technology are currently being used to address some of these problems. Despite these current uses, blockchain adoption likely will be incremental and more evolutionary than revolutionary, at first. Longer term, blockchain technology could provide a more comprehensive solution for the industry.
Continue Reading How Blockchain Technology Can Improve the Music Industry

Khloe Kardashian is the latest Kardashian to find herself in court over her activities on social media. The youngest Kardashian sister was sued by a photographer for copyright infringement in Xposure Photos UK Ltd v Khloe Kardashian et al, 2:17-CV-3088 (C.D. Cal). Xposure alleges that Ms. Kardashian posted a photo it owned on her Instagram without permission and without the copyright attribution notice included on the original. For brands, celebrities, influencers, and others who use social media, particularly to make money or for promotion, this serves as a good reminder that all rights in any photographs, videos, and other content they post on social media must be cleared.
Continue Reading The Kardashians Can’t Keep Up With Copyright Law

The U.S. Copyright Office’s new electronic system for copyright-agent registration and maintenance goes into effect on December 1, 2016, and with it comes new rules. Beginning December 1, all online service providers must submit new designated-agent information to the Copyright Office through the online registration system. Electronic designations should be filed on December 1, 2016, or as soon as possible thereafter. Service providers who fail to timely submit electronic designations will be ineligible for the safe harbor from copyright-infringement liability provided by § 512(c) of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.
Continue Reading Don’t Lose Your DMCA Safe Harbor Protection!