Musicians shortchanged by AI deals with labels, lawsuit alleges

This is read by an automated voice.Please report any issues or inconsistencies here.

Musicians have been left out of settlements between major record labels and AI companies, a new lawsuit alleges.The American Federation of Musicians of the United States and Canada (AFM), which has 70,000 members, said Universal Music Group and Warner Music Group “received significant compensation” from the AI companies for past copyright violations and licensed “substantial” portions of their music catalogs to them, but haven’t shared that with the musicians.UMG and WMG sued AI companies Udio and Suno in 2024, accusing them of copyright infringement.

Both companies settled with Udio last year.In November, WMG announced a partnership with Suno, but Universal Music Group’s lawsuit against Suno is poending.“While the Defendants protected their own interests and created a significant source of new revenue with the retrospective settlements and prospective licenses, they have refused to compensate the musicians whose work – created with their own instruments and through their talent, creativity, and hard work – is fed into AI machines for profit,” AFM said in its lawsuit, filed in U.S.

District Court in New York on Friday.AFM said it believes the AI settlements fall under the “new use” provision of its collective bargaining agreements, which requires music companies to notify the union of new licenses for purposes not covered by the contract and to compensate musicians, whose work was used to train AI models.

Hollywood Inc.Universal Music Group reached a settlement with AI startup Udio, ending a legal battle in which UMG had accused Udio of taking copyrighted music to train its AI model.UMG and WMG said in statements that they are in negotiations on a collective bargaining agreement with AFM.

“Warner Music Group is growing the value of music by establishing guardrails and architecting a healthy AI ecosystem on behalf of artists everywhere,” the company s...