AI giant Anthropic is facing legal action from the owners of Elvis Presley's music. The company is alleged to have used Elvis' work to train its AI models without obtaining consent to do so. The lawsuit was reportedly filed on Friday, October 23, per Billboard.
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"The new lawsuit, filed Friday (Oct. 23) and first reported by Billboard, claims that Anthropic, the tech behemoth behind Claude, infringed 274 of the rock legend's copyrighted songs, including famed hits like 'Can't Help Falling in Love,' 'A Little Less Conversation,' and 'Don't Be Cruel,'" Billboard reports.
Richard Busch, the lead attorney spearheading the lawsuit, has since released a short statement regarding the situation.
"The Elvis Plaintiffs bring this action to enforce these exclusive rights against the defendant that has built its entire business model based on copyright infringement at a scale never seen before," Busch wrote. "The Elvis Plaintiffs are deeply protective of these iconic songs."
The battle between creatives, copyright holders, and AI companies has been waging for years. AI is seemingly being trained on countless copyrighted works, as it seeks to continually improve, thus putting hundreds of thousands of jobs at risk. However, those same AI companies argue that their process fits within the copyright fair use law.
Elvis Presley's Music Is in Good Hands With Richard Busch
Precedent surrounding AI companies using copyrighted work to train their AI models is currently thin. We're dealing with a whole new world of issues stemming from the continued rise and growth of AI. However, in Busch, Elvis Presley's legendary work is in great hands.
Busch has previously represented rap legend Eminem in what became a landmark 2000s case regarding digital downloads. He also represented Marvin Gaye's estate in a copyright case against Robin Thicke and Pharrell Williams.
It's safe to say that Busch is experienced in fighting uphill digital battles regarding copyright laws and the grey areas that can exist online. However, Anthropic is fighting multiple lawsuits at once and will undoubtedly have a string of very expensive lawyers on hand. As such, this is a battle that could wage on for quite some time.
Hopefully, though, common sense wins out, and AI is forced to stop learning from other people's genius.
