Legal Clash Over
After half a decade, the legal fight between Spotify and Eminem’s Eight Mile Style has finally wrapped up.
In 2019, Eight Mile Style took Spotify to court, accusing it of pretending to have proper licenses to stream over 240 of Eminem’s songs. They said only some of the music was under their control and used Kobalt Music Group to collect royalties. They aimed for almost $40 million, saying they didn’t get paid for billions of streams.
This week, a Tennessee judge said Spotify didn’t have a license for those songs, but it’s not responsible for the lost royalties. The judge’s decision is tied to Spotify’s 2020 response that blamed Kobalt Music Group, claiming it had the right to reproduce and distribute the songs.
Fans think this whole situation is pretty confusing.
Judge Aleta A. Trauger decided that even if Spotify was wrong, Kobalt Music Group would face the penalties for not collecting royalties for Eight Mile Style.
“While Spotify’s handling of composer copyrights appears to have been seriously flawed, any right to recover damages based on those flaws belongs to those innocent rights holders who were genuinely harmed,” Judge Trauter stated, according to Music Business Worldwide. “Not ones who, like Eight Mile Style, had every opportunity to set things right and simply chose not to do so for no apparent reason, other than that being the victim of infringement pays better than being an ordinary licensor.”
Since Spotify isn’t liable for damages, Kobalt will probably have to cover some legal fees from the past five years.
