Music Publishers File for Summary Judgment Against Anthropic — 'Copyright Infringement on a Massive Scale'

Universal Music Group, Concord, and ABKCO have filed a motion for summary judgment in San Jose federal court, asking a judge to rule that Anthropic's use of copyrighted song lyrics to train its Claude AI model constitutes copyright infringement 'on a massive scale.' The filing argues that Claude produces AI-generated lyrics that serve as market-diluting derivatives of the originals, directly challenging the tech industry's standard fair use defence. The case involves lyrics from at least 500 songs by artists including the Beach Boys, the Rolling Stones, and Beyoncé. A separate lawsuit by BMG against Anthropic was filed one week earlier.