by Elon Musk scored a major legal victory on Tuesday when a US district court judge threw out most of a lawsuit filed against his social media platform, X, by 17 music publishers.
But the ruling also comes with an arrest-with some of the central allegations of the lawsuit unable to move forward.
The music publishers, including Sony and Universal Music, accused X of ignoring copyrights on 1700 songs by allowing people to post clips from artists including Taylor Swift on his platform without permission. The companies pointed out in their June, 2023 filing: “Twitter’s incentive not to act quickly is clear. Twitter wants to get the most out of the infringing content on its platform before the tweet is deleted. As a general suggestion, the value of a tweet to Twitter decreases over time.”
BMG, Sony, Universal Music and other members of the National Music Publishers‘ Association (NMPA) trade group was seeking more than $250 million in damages, claiming that “Twitter has made the process of uploading infringing music to its platform extremely easy for users, requiring only a few what happens.”
They added “The reality is that Twitter routinely ignores repeated and known violations, refusing to take simple steps available to Twitter to stop these specific instances of violations that it is on the information about them.”
US District Judge Aleta Trauger, however, did not blame X for direct infringement in her 21-page ruling on Tuesday, noting the difference in federal copyright law between being an active participant in the infringement and simply the platform which provides it.
She added that Twitter appeared to be less strict on “verified” individuals, which was “particularly striking”.
“If X Corp. approved. indeed for some users to effectively purchase the right to be able to infringe with less severe consequences, it was a case of promoting the use of X/Twitter to infringe copyright,” wrote Trauger.
Twitter filed for dismissal last August, claiming that social media sites are not responsible and do not directly violate copyrights when illegal content is posted on its platform. On Tuesday, Judge Trauger agreed.
“There is no basis in law to conclude that an operator of a social media platform will face liability simply because it was less strict in its enforcement than copyright holders would have preferred,” Trauger said, adding that the court will dismiss the publishers’ theory. with general and comprehensive liability for infringement across the X/Twitter platform.”
“X Corp undoubtedly had some power. on X/Twitter users—the way a company that provides a valuable service always has power over the customers who depend on it—but that doesn’t turn customers into the loose equivalent of agents or servants. “
Judge Trauger dismissed two counts of infringement – Direct Copyright Infringement and Vicarious Infringement – along with a third Contributory Infringement – but she took exception to infringement allegations that the platform provided “softer copyright enforcement for ‘verified’ users,” which failed “failed to act on takedown notices in a timely manner” and failed to “take reasonable steps in response to serious serial violations.”
Trauger said the alleged conduct, if proven, could see Twitter liable for damages.
“If X Corp. was seriously delayed. responding to valid notices to take down, or if he completely ignores certain notices which were facially and in fact valid, which may support liability.”
A lawyer for the X pair did not immediately respond to requests for comment. A spokesperson for the NMPA told The Daily Beast: “We are pleased that the court recognized Twitter’s potential liability and that the publishers’ copyright infringement claims for all the works asserted in the case will move forward. The opinion makes clear that Twitter may be liable for failure to reasonably respond to publishers’ takedown notices.
Twitter must act reasonably in relation to known violations and known repeated violations. The spread of music piracy rampant on the scene is clear and unacceptable, and we look forward to direct compensation for the songwriters and music publishers whose works are being stolen.”
An initial case management conference has been rescheduled for May 20, 2024.
Musk bought Twitter in October.22 for $44 billion.
At the time of filing, the publishers noted successful deals with other social media companies “to pioneer innovative and highly successful frameworks for social media patrons to legally use Publishers’ songs on those platforms.” He named agreements on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Snapchat and TikTok — although the latter Universal removed its library on January 30, saying in an open letter that the companies failed to reach an agreement on three main issues: “appropriate compensation for our artists and singers, protecting human artists from the harmful effects of AI, and online safety for TikTok users.”
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