Music industry: antitrust, DMCA, AI

Live music’s back-end business is shifting in courtrooms and chatbots at the same time. Live Nation is still fighting states in antitrust court, the Supreme Court just ruled in a major Digital Millennium Copyright Act case, Spotify is expanding prompt-based playlist tools, and Ticketmaster has launched an app inside ChatGPT. (justice.gov) (supremecourt.gov) (newsroom.spotify.com) (business.ticketmaster.com) The Live Nation case started on May 23, 2024, when the United States and multiple states sued the concert giant and Ticketmaster. The Justice Department’s case page shows Judge Arun Subramanian denied Live Nation’s motion to dismiss on March 14, 2025, after earlier denying a motion to transfer venue on October 3, 2024. (justice.gov) That case split in March 2026. Live Nation said on March 9 that it reached a settlement with the Justice Department without admitting wrongdoing, while Associated Press reported 34 states kept pressing monopoly claims at trial and jurors began deliberating on April 11 without a verdict on day one. (newsroom.livenation.com) (apnews.com) The copyright fight turns on a different gatekeeper: internet providers. Section 512 of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act gives online services a legal shield from money damages if they follow rules such as quickly handling takedown notices and reasonably enforcing a policy for repeat infringers. (copyright.gov) On March 25, 2026, the Supreme Court decided Cox Communications v. Sony Music Entertainment. The Court said contributory copyright liability requires intent, and the syllabus says Sony had sent Cox 163,148 infringement notices over roughly two years before a jury awarded $1 billion in statutory damages. (supremecourt.gov) Spotify’s current experiment is not a text-to-song generator. Its January 22 announcement says “Prompted Playlist” lets Premium users describe a mood, memory, or use case in plain language, and Spotify builds a playlist using listening history plus real-time music trends, with the beta expanding in the United States and Canada after starting in New Zealand in December 2025. (newsroom.spotify.com) Spotify has framed that tool as guided recommendation, not full automation. The company says users can edit the prompt, ask for deeper cuts or emerging artists, and steer the playlist by including or excluding genres, artists, or contexts. (newsroom.spotify.com) Ticketmaster’s April 9 announcement pushes the same idea one step closer to checkout. The company said fans can connect a Ticketmaster app inside ChatGPT, ask about local concerts or games, compare seating and prices, and then complete the purchase on Ticketmaster’s marketplace. (business.ticketmaster.com) Ticketmaster also said OpenAI is testing sponsored ad placements in ChatGPT and that Ticketmaster is part of that paid marketing pilot. In the same post, Ticketmaster said ChatGPT has 900 million weekly active users, a figure it used to pitch the tool to event clients. (business.ticketmaster.com) The through line is control over access: who gets tickets, who gets distribution, who loses legal protection, and who shapes discovery. In April 2026, those fights are landing in three places at once — a Manhattan antitrust courtroom, a Supreme Court opinion on copyright liability, and consumer music tools built around prompts and chat. (apnews.com) (supremecourt.gov) (business.ticketmaster.com)