Friday in Munich: Europe's first big AI music copyright verdict
On July 31, Munich's Regional Court rules in GEMA v. Suno — the first major European decision on whether training AI music models on copyrighted songs requires licenses. GEMA, representing 95,000+ German composers and publishers, sued Suno in January 2025. Under German law the judgment is enforceable immediately, even during appeal, so a GEMA win could disrupt Suno's European operations within days.
Why it mattersEvery AI company trains on someone's creative work; courts are only now deciding whether that's legal. A licensing requirement in Europe's largest economy would set the template — and the bill — for the entire generative AI industry, well beyond music.
Read in the app — free, in 9 languages
Related stories
Nevada just cleared up to 8,000 driverless taxis for Las Vegas — Tesla's ceiling went from 10 to 5,000 in five weeks2026-08-21Apple Music will tell you when a song was made by a machine — but the uploader decides whether to say so
2026-08-21OpenAI has started a team whose stated worry is that a company like OpenAI ends up with too much power
2026-08-21Adobe will now generate the music, the voiceover and the door slam — and it says the licence covers you
2026-08-21OpenAI says it can police misuse without keeping your company's data — and it is pointing at Anthropic while saying so
2026-08-20