X (Twitter) Asks Court to Dismiss $250 Million Lawsuit From Music Publishers

The social media platform formerly known as Twitter, X, has asked for the dismissal of a lawsuit brought against it by the National Music Publishers' Association. The NMPA is suing Twitter on behalf of 17 music publishers who accused the platform of copyright infringement.

What the lawsuit said: The suit, filed in June, names X Corp as the sole defendant and accuses it of "rampant infringement of copyrighted music" amounting to "hundreds of thousands" of alleged infringements of around 1,700 songs. The suit asked the court to fine X up to $150,000 for each violation and is seeking over $250 million in damages.

Much of the infringement discussed in the suit surrounds music videos, live performance videos or other videos that include copyrighted music. The suit claims that X has failed to remove infringing content after being notified and uses the videos to increase the amount of time users spend on its site. "Twitter fuels its business with countless infringing copies of musical compositions, violating Publishers' and others’ exclusive rights under copyright law," the suit reads.

The suit also claims the platform "continued to assist known repeat infringers with their infringement" and cited tweets from Musk including one advising a user to "consider turning on subscriptions," which the suit sees as Musk encouraging the user to pay X to hide the infringing material they were posting.

What they're saying: X argued that the company could not be penalized for posts by its users. "In this case, plaintiffs do not allege that X encouraged, induced, or took affirmative steps with the intent to foster the infringement of plaintiffs’ works," the company’s lawyers wrote. "To the contrary, X’s anti-infringement policies and practices … belie any reasonable assumption that X has induced its users to infringe any copyrights."

Many other social media platforms have entered into licensing agreements with music publishers, something X has not done. X's lawyers argued that any licensing deals the NMPA is seeking are not legally required to avoid a copyright lawsuit.