X vs. Music Publishers: Victory for Elon Musk—kind of
Seventeen music publishers sue X for $250 million. Judge says "not so fast".
A report from The Daily Beast says seventeen music publishers, including Sony and Universal Music Group, sued social media platform X (formerly known as Twitter) for letting people post clips of copyrighted songs without permission. Not only did the publishers want X to take down the music, but they wanted the social media platform to pay them over $250 million in damages.
A judge recently decided some parts of the lawsuit could move forward, but threw out other parts of the case. Here's a quick rundown of what that means:
The publishers can't sue X for directly stealing the music. Copyright law treats websites differently.
X won the case mostly because the judge said it's not responsible for everything users post, just like other social media platforms like YouTube or Facebook.
However, the judge said X might still be in trouble for a few things:
If X lets some important users (like verified accounts) get away with copyright infringement more easily than others.
If X takes too long to remove infringing content after the publishers tell them about it.
If X ignores repeat offenders who keep posting copyrighted music even after being warned.
Basically, the judge said X isn't directly on the hook for everything users post. Still, it does have some responsibility to take down copyrighted material if the publishers properly complain about it.
The lawsuit will continue to see if X is actually guilty of these things and how much money they might have to pay to the music publishers.
Time will tell.
My Thoughts: You know? I’m not quite sure how I feel about this. On one hand, of course, the music publishers are correct and have every right to be upset and sue X for damages. I mean, it is their music, right? But on the other hand, don’t these music publishers actually gain something from users sharing song clips of their artists? Isn’t this what the music publishers want? Shouldn’t it be what they want? In a world that measures social media success by virality, doesn’t the more people who share as song clip only increase the chances of a song going viral and becoming a hit?
Honestly, I’m not sure what the answer is here. And I really don’t care either way. But if I have to choose a side, I think I lean more toward the phrase: don’t bite the hand that feeds you. That is, don’t take down the very platform that can deliver you great success.