Anthropic faces its next fair use test over song lyrics

Two federal judges in California have already tackled whether training AI on copyrighted work is fair use, and they didn't fully agree. On Wednesday, US District Judge Eumi Lee in San Jose hears from Anthropic and the music publishers suing it in a case that could shape the answer.

In 2023, Universal Music Group (UMG), Concord, and Allen & Betty Klein and Company (ABKCO) filed a lawsuit against Anthropic for copyright infringement by using the lyrics to train Claude in hundreds of songs featuring artists such as Beyoncé, the Rolling Stones, and the Beach Boys.

In a filing from March, they claimed the usage is not fair as Claude can create new lyrics to dilute the market for their catalogues. Moreover, they claimed that songs generated through AI are flooding streaming platforms and even topping the Billboard charts.

Anthropic asserts that training is transformative, suggesting that through the lyrics, Claude is trained in human language for advances in science, business, and education.

To prevent copyright holders from blocking this technology would be to disregard the position of the Supreme Court that copyright is meant for the benefit of the general public and not the authors.

Last year, retired Judge William Alsup supported Anthropic in the utilisation of books for training while, two days after, Judge Vince Chhabria gave a judgement favouring Meta in a similar dispute but cautioned that the training may not constitute a fair use "in many circumstances."

Tech companies, such as OpenAI and Meta, consider training to be fair use as it creates something new and transformative.

Lee's decision will likely influence dozens of lawsuits by authors, news outlets and visual artists against Anthropic, OpenAI, Meta and other tech giants.

She has already weighed in once. In March 2025, she refused to block Anthropic from using the lyrics for training, saying the publishers were asking her to define a licensing market while fair use remained unsettled.