🚨Live coverage of testimony by SeatGeek CEO on LiveNation in this thread.
SeatGeek's generally been lousy to artists, and the way they've conducted themselves in many public policy debates has been dishonest and inexcusable. But they have a reasonable and serious complaint here.
Did they really quote the Borg?
On other issues, though we have seen what seemed like a reflexive opposition to relatively benign efforts to allow creators to protect themselves using copyright. One example is the CASE Act. Another was the CLASSICS act.
There are a few places where we’ve been able to find alignment. Appreciated his inclusion of the chapter about radio consolidation and his 2022 book for example.
Definitely does. It’s a lot of hand waving about how if we don’t let the companies train their AI this way, it’s dangerous to fair use and has a range of other bad impacts. Generally though Cory has a very, very broad reading of fair use, at odds with what most creative worker groups believe.
Not a good piece. Cory mostly sides with the AI companies on the legality of unlicensed training and his analysis suffers as a result.
Also...generative AI works don't need to be protected by copyright to cause economic harm to creators whose work they train on and compete against. Such works still result in downward pressure on rates in licensing discussion.
Doctorow sides with the big extractive AI companies on the question of whether AI training counts as fair use. He's entitled to that view. But when he minimizes the harm associated with that view (and tries to shift focus to bosses) he's misrepresenting the landscape.
This is a very strange reading of SCOTUS' denial of cert in Thaler vs Perlmutter. The decision isn't limited to creative workers' "bosses." It's also about creative workers' *competitors.*
Doctorow wants us to imagine only bosses benefit from copyright. That's just not true.
Day 2 of the Live Nation trial is underway, with both sides offering opening statements. Note that the standard for liability here is "a preponderance of evidence"--the jury must agree that at least one of the government's claims meets this standard, which is lower than "beyond a reasonable doubt."
Bleak!
The rise of the DJ clout deepfake, because dance music isn't in enough trouble. My newest is up at Rolling Stone.
www.rollingstone.com/music/music-...
POLLSTAR: To what do you attribute your longevity? In many ways, you seem like an eternal adolescent.
JONATHAN RICHMAN: Me, young? If so, perhaps gratitude for life itself comes into play.
news.pollstar.com/2026/02/10/t...
No, masters ownership was going up prior to streaming. (in part because termination of transfer was kicking in.)
Musicians are more likely to own their own masters than at any time in the history of recorded music. Access to remedies is a challenge, of course, but ensuring that genAI without human involvement doesn't get copyright protection does mitigate downward pressure on licensing & rates.
Live Nation trial update: a jury of 12 has been successfully selected. Trial will resume tomorrow.
The best advice is to read the Copyright Office's report. www.copyright.gov/ai/Copyright...
As Zvi Rosen has argued, "the focus on a caricature of Disney as a litigious bully emblematic of copyright stakeholders has been a useful smokescreen by which the actual copyright debates of today are obscured. As such the question becomes cui bono – who benefits from this?"
This is completely wrong.
In that case, that's just secondary to the difficulty of filing infringement claims--CASE act has been one useful tool.
The trial kicks off today!
Yes! The case specifically concerned visual art but applies to creative works of all disciplines.
This is unlikely to be a real issue in nearly all cases. The Office does not proactively investigate whether works are made with AI to be able to register them, so the challenge would have to come from a third party (eg in an infringement suit) and the burden of proof would lie with that third party
Works that contain some AI generated elements can still be registered, but the AI generated elements are not covered by the copyright protection.
Today's decision underscores that point, and also underscores the importance of careful legal analysis and dialogue with diverse stakeholders before rushing into campaigning to "do something." Artists of all disciplines are all stronger when we work together and learn from each other.
When the AI hype-cycle was just exploding, some groups demanded a new law declaring that "large corporations" should not be granted copyright protection for AI works. That was weird and misguided, because the law is pretty clear that *nobody* can register AI created works for copyright protection.
SCOTUS has denied cert. in Thaler v. Perlmutter. That means that outputs generated by AI will continue to be ineligible for copyright protection under US law.
This is welcome news for musicians!
A judge just allowed key antitrust claims against Live Nation and Ticketmaster to proceed, including allegations they pressured venues and shut out competitors.
Fans deserve transparency — and this case should move forward.
www.musicbusinessworldwide.com/live-nation-...
Yes, elite tech interests and those who align with them frequently misattribute artists’ arguments on policy issues to major labels (that is, alleged monopolists) as a way of not having to take the arguments seriously as coming from artists themselves.
In some ways, it’s just a subset of the straw-person fallacy. Sometimes with the slippery slope fallacy bolted onto it. Where it’s especially ugly, though is when he uses it against people who historically haven’t had much institutional or discursive power.
