Music Duo The American Dollar Sue Suno for $35 million

Suno is being sued for copyright infringement by music duo The American Dollar, whose compositions have been used by brands such as Apple and in shows like CSI: Miami.

The allegations:

• The complaint was filed by Poseidon Wave Media – which is representing the duo – in the US District Court for the Southern District of New York on May 12.

• It alleges that Suno ingested 236 of the duo’s sound recordings and compositions without authorization.

• Those recordings were then used to train Suno’s AI models.

• The duo is seeking up to $150,000 per track infringement, totalling over $35 million.

• Digital Music News says Poseidon is also seeking a declaration of willful infringement, a preliminary and permanent injunction, and Suno’s profits from infringement.

• It is also demanding a jury trial.

Diminished income:

• One of the plaintiffs' key claims is that the volume of AI content produced by Suno has reduced their licensing revenue by nearly 80% since the platform’s public launch.

• As per Digital Music News, to support their claims they used a Suno Pro account and input text prompts that specifically referenced their song titles.

• Suno then produced songs that mimicked “their unique musical architecture.”

• The American Dollar allege that Suno's use of their music to train its AI models has resulted in competing tracks entering the market which were, damningly, informed by their work.

What they said:

• An excerpt from the filing: “The decades it has taken for plaintiff to develop and refine their process and methods of music creation, and the weeks to month spent by plaintiff in developing each single original musical piece, has been co-opted by defendant and used to supplant plaintiff’s original musical works in the marketplace.”