In the United States, Global Music Rights (GMR) and Music Choice have settled a federal copyright infringement lawsuit over 95 songs. A joint stipulation filed Friday (August 7) in the US District Court for the Central District of California dismissed the case with prejudice.
The four-page filing states that “the Parties have entered into a settlement agreement to dispose of this action in its entirety.” The dismissal bars GMR from bringing the same claims again, with each party bearing its own attorneys’ fees, costs, and expenses.
Neither the financial terms of the settlement nor any licensing arrangement between the two companies is disclosed in the document, which was signed by counsel for both sides on August 7.
The court had twice approved extensions to Music Choice’s deadline to respond to the complaint, first to July 27 and then to August 10. The stipulation was filed three days before that second deadline expired, and no response to the complaint appears on the docket.
Complaint and alleged infringement
GMR filed the complaint on June 8, alleging that Music Choice continued performing songs from its catalog after the companies’ license agreement lapsed on December 31, 2025. The performance rights organization (PRO) sought maximum statutory damages of USD $150,000 for each of the 95 compositions, a ceiling of roughly USD $14.25 million, plus a permanent injunction, attorneys’ fees and costs.
Works named in an exhibit to the complaint included Bruce Springsteen’s Born to Run and Dancing in the Dark, plus Bad Guy and What Was I Made For? by Billie Eilish and Finneas.
The complaint described the alleged infringement as “willful, intentional, purposeful, and in disregard of and indifferent to the rights of Global Music Rights.”
“Music Choice made the strategic decision not to pay Global Music Rights for these uses and hoped to get away with it. But Music Choice did not get away with it. Music Choice has been caught red handed.”
Announcing the suit in June, GMR General Counsel Emio Zizza said: “We only turn to litigation as a last resort. But it’s well-established law that our clients’ copyrighted works can’t be publicly performed without a license.”
Zizza added: “The many, many services that have entered into a GMR license and are paying their fees deserve the benefit of that license. Services that don’t want to pay for a GMR license don’t get to use our catalog and deprive our clients of their due.”
Earlier GMR infringement cases
Music Choice is the target of the fifth infringement case GMR has filed in federal court since October 2022. None of the four earlier cases reached trial, and each sought the same statutory maximum of USD $150,000 per work. That figure is the ceiling set by US copyright law for willful infringement, and a rightsholder claiming statutory damages does not have to demonstrate what it actually lost.
- In October 2022, GMR filed three cases on the same basis: against Red Wolf Broadcasting, against One Putt Broadcasting, and against Southern Stone Communications and Black Crow Media Group jointly.
- It settled with Red Wolf and One Putt on January 20, 2023, with both companies entering long-term licenses on undisclosed terms.
- GMR then sued Vermont Broadcast Associates in January 2024 over 66 songs, and settled three months later on terms that again included a long-term GMR license and a resolution of past alleged infringements.
Zizza said of the 2023 agreement: “We are dedicated to protecting the rights of GMR songwriters and composers, and ensuring entities publicly performing their works are appropriately licensed. Through this lawsuit, we have accomplished those endeavors, and look forward to our go-forward licensing relationship with Red Wolf.”
The Music Choice stipulation does not say whether that pattern held a fifth time.
Music Choice background and prior litigation
Music Choice is based in Horsham, Pennsylvania, and has operated in the music industry for close to four decades, according to GMR’s complaint. The company says it has been a staple in the home for more than 35 years, growing out of cable television into what it calls “a multi-platform experience built for how people listen today.”
Its channels come with most cable packages, and Music Choice also sells a standalone subscription for mobile devices and select smart TVs. A separate arm, Music Choice for Business, supplies music to commercial premises.
The company is owned by a consortium that includes the following, according to the complaint:
- Sony Corporation of America
- Charter Communications
- Comcast Corporation
- Cox Communications
- Microsoft
Music Choice’s business establishment service has attracted litigation before. SoundExchange sued Music Choice in April 2019, alleging that an audit had found the company underreporting the gross proceeds on which its statutory sound recording royalties were calculated. A federal judge referred that dispute to the Copyright Royalty Board in December 2021, finding the Board better placed to interpret its own rate regulation.
The lawyer who represented Music Choice in that defense appears again in the GMR stipulation. Music Choice was represented in the GMR case by Kelly Perigoe of King & Spalding in Los Angeles, and by Paul Fakler, a partner in the firm’s New York office, listed in the filing with his pro hac vice application still to come.
King & Spalding says Fakler represented Music Choice in the SoundExchange litigation. The firm says he has also handled Music Choice’s Preexisting Subscription Service rate case before the Copyright Royalty Board, along with “every prior rate proceeding for Music Choice since the creation of the CRB.”
