At a hearing on Wednesday, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Mary Strobel indicated that she was leaning towards rejecting a motion by Warner, Universal, Sony, Capitol and ABKCO Records to accept the labels' interpretation of the law in jury instructions. The plaintiffs believe that state laws protect the misappropriation of older sound recordings that were authored before falling under federal copyright protection. But the judge isn't ready to go so far.
The lawsuits against the satellite broadcaster have piled up in the past year over the broadcasts of pre-1972 tunes. There's the $100-million class-action suit led by Flo & Eddie of the Turtles, in which the band behind "Happy Together" contends that state law protects pre-'72 music and the broadcaster can't rely on statutory royalty rates for the recordings. (The Turtles filed similar suits in Florida and New York, leading Sirius to accuse them of "lawsuit lottery.") Then there's the $100-million suit from SoundExchange, a non-profit performance rights organization, claiming SiriusXM underpaid federal royalties for pre-'72 tunes.
The lawsuit from the major record labels represents one of the biggest tests -- and because the plaintiffs are jumping to jury instructions, offered the prospect of some early guidance on an issue that potentially impacts not just SiriusXM, but Pandora, other website operators, television broadcasters and restaurants throughout the nation that perform pre-1972 music.
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