We are the music makers

Topic

Copyright

  • The DOJ says AI training is fair use. Music's best arguments were never about training

    The US Justice Department has told the court in the New York Times' case against OpenAI that training AI models on copyrighted text is fair use, and it goes out of its way to reject the "market dilution" theory the music industry leans on. It leaves outputs, data sourcing and identity open, and that is where artists' claims are strongest.

    Artist rightsvia US Department of Justice (copy hosted by MusicTechPolicy)

  • The EU AI Act's training rules are now enforceable. What musicians can actually do with them

    From 2 August 2026 the Commission's AI Office can fine general-purpose AI providers that skip their copyright policy or their public summary of training content. The rules give musicians a reference point and a complaint route, but not a list of their songs or a payment. Here is what you can check, what you can reserve, and where the gaps are.

    Artist rightsvia European Commission

  • Brazil's music societies told big tech to license now. The AI bill is still waiting

    ECAD, Brazil's central collecting office, and the music societies that run it joined broadcasters and publishers in a letter to OpenAI, Google, Microsoft, Meta, Apple, Amazon and others. It says AI use of their members' work needs authorisation and payment under the 1998 copyright law, and invites talks to avoid litigation. Brazil's AI bill, which would write that into statute, has stalled in the Chamber of Deputies until after the elections.

    AIvia Ecad

  • 'Do not train' opt-outs for musicians: what works, what courts have said, and how to set one up

    EU law lets you reserve your music from commercial AI training, and German courts have now said what a valid reservation looks like. Opt-outs are worth setting up, but treat them as evidence for later rather than a lock. Here is a realistic setup, from robots.txt to your collecting society, and where it stops working.

    Artist rightsvia Publications Office of the European Union

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