The biggest AI copyright case in the United States is about newspapers and books, not songs. The music industry has now made sure the judge hears about music too. On Friday 30 October 2026, nine US music organisations, led by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) and the National Music Publishers’ Association (NMPA), filed a proposed brief in the New York Times’ case against OpenAI and Microsoft, asking the court to rule that training AI on the plaintiffs’ works without a licence is not fair use, Music Business Worldwide reports.
They were not alone. The same day, a group led by Cate Blanchett’s Human Consent Foundation, talent agency CAA and Irving Azoff’s Music Artists Coalition asked for permission to file a brief on whether creative rights can be licensed for AI at scale. A day earlier, the American Federation of Musicians filed a brief with SAG-AFTRA and both branches of the Writers Guild of America. Judge Sidney Stein has not ruled.
What the case is about
The case, In re OpenAI, Inc. Copyright Infringement Litigation in the US District Court for the Southern District of New York, combines the Times’ lawsuit with others brought against OpenAI and Microsoft, including suits by book authors. Both sides have asked Judge Stein to settle its central question without a trial: whether training AI models on copyrighted works without a licence is fair use, the exception in US copyright law that allows some reuse without permission.
Microsoft has asked the court to hold that training a general-purpose large language model on copyrighted works is fair use as a matter of law, according to the RIAA brief. In September, the US Justice Department sided with OpenAI, telling the judge that training AI models on text without a licence is fair use, MBW reports.
What the music industry told the court
The RIAA and NMPA’s co-signers are A2IM, Songwriters of North America, the Black Music Action Coalition, the Recording Academy, ASCAP, BMI and the Artist Rights Alliance. Together they say their members “own or control the majority of music consumed in the United States.” Their main arguments, as reported by MBW, which obtained the brief:
- Substitution: “AI companies copy millions of copyrighted sound recordings and musical compositions without authorization to train their models to generate a limitless supply of synthetic substitutes that invade the music marketplace,” the brief states. “AI-generated music floods streaming platforms, tops charts, and dominates social media playlists.”
- Purpose: the brief argues a model trained on “a John Grisham novel or a Stevie Wonder song” is learning to produce “a Grisham-like legal thriller or a Wonder-like audio file,” not just learning about language or music in general.
- Licensing: “It is thus a myth that licensing copyrighted works for AI training is either too ‘sporadic’ or speculative to establish a ‘reasonable licensing’ market,” the groups say, pointing to AI deals the majors and independents have struck with KLAY, Udio, Suno and ElevenLabs, and to blanket licensing through ASCAP and BMI.
- Scale: the brief cites Deezer’s estimate that AI-generated tracks make up “over 50% of all new music uploaded to the platform.”
The brief also responds to the Justice Department’s comparison of AI training with Joan Didion drawing on Ernest Hemingway. “Law-abiding authors pay for the modest universe of works that inspire them,” the groups wrote. “They do not steal them by the millions and encode copies on their brains like an AI system does.” It also cites the Third Circuit appeals court’s September ruling that rejected a fair use defence over AI training in Thomson Reuters’ case against Ross Intelligence.
The licensing-at-scale argument
The filing led by the Human Consent Foundation, CAA and the Music Artists Coalition takes “no position on the ultimate disposition” of the motions. Instead it tackles a practical question raised by OpenAI and Microsoft: whether rights for AI training “can practically be identified, cleared, and licensed at scale, and whether a functioning market exists for those uses.” According to TheWrap, which obtained the brief, it argues the creative industries have “a proven infrastructure and workflows to clear rights for dispersed works at scale,” citing collective licensing bodies such as CISAC and BMI. Its appendix of supporters includes Madonna and Bette Midler, TheWrap reports.
A further brief backing the plaintiffs came from the AI Coalition for Data Integrity and nine other organisations, including the Association of Independent Music Publishers and the Music Workers Alliance. MBW reports it puts before the court the Munich Regional Court’s first-instance rulings in German collecting society GEMA’s cases against OpenAI and Suno.
What musicians’ unions said
The AFM, SAG-AFTRA and the two Writers Guilds filed their proposed brief on 29 October, urging the court not to adopt a categorical fair use rule for AI training. They argue the question reaches far beyond text: “A foundation model trained on everything powers products that can generate anything, including scripts, songs, voices, and video. A ruling that training is categorically fair use would reach all uses across all industries.” The unions also say such a ruling “would render moot the terms the Unions and the industry agreed to at the bargaining table.” For the AFM’s wider campaign, see Musicians Union Demands AI Consent and Pay From Labels.
Why it matters
For AI music lawsuits
The music groups are not parties to this case and are not seeking damages from OpenAI or Microsoft. But a ruling in the tech companies’ favour could give AI firms being sued by the music business, including Suno, Udio and Anthropic, a fair use decision from a New York federal court to cite in their own defence, MBW reports. Sony Music has two lawsuits against Udio pending in the same court. Fair use is already at the centre of the labels’ fight with Suno, which we covered in Suno Lawsuit: Labels Can Depose Ex-Menlo Exec Over Post, and of the claims in Reservoir Sues Suno and Anthropic Over AI Music Training.
For artists and AI music creators
The briefs push a clear message: the music industry wants AI built on licensed, consented catalogues, and says that market already exists. For creators using AI tools, the outcome could shape which tools survive and on what terms. A ruling against fair use would strengthen the hand of rights holders negotiating licences. A ruling for the tech companies would make those deals harder to insist on in the US.
For Australia
This is US law, so it will not change Australian copyright directly. But the result will be watched closely here. Music publishers have urged Australia to wait for the outcome of US AI copyright lawsuits before rewriting its own rules, and a federal parliamentary AI committee is due to report in November, as covered in AI Copyright in Australia: Publishers Slam Opt-Out Plan.
What happens next
The briefs are proposed filings, so the court first has to accept them. Judge Stein has yet to rule on either side’s request for summary judgment, and no ruling date has been reported. Dizy will keep tracking the case alongside the music industry’s own lawsuits against AI companies.
Following AI music on Dizy
Dizy charts original tracks, and artists declare whether a track is AI-assisted or AI-generated when they submit. See the Top 100 and New releases, browse AI artists, or submit your track. For a guide to reading the numbers, see How to Read AI Music Charts Like a Cultural Top 40.
