Epidemic Sound, AB v. Meta Platforms, Inc.

Background

Epidemic Sound brought this copyright-infringement action, alleging that Meta infringed 900 of its copyrighted songs. The discovery dispute concerned Request No. 27, which sought all data associated with Epidemic’s Rights Manager account.

Meta initially stated that it would produce responsive, non-privileged information associated with the account, subject to Epidemic’s consent and a reasonable, good-faith search. Meta later removed a date limitation from that response. More than a year before this order, Meta amended its response to say that it would produce only data connected to the 900 copyrights asserted in the complaint.

Discovery Dispute

Epidemic moved to compel production of all data in its Rights Manager account, including data associated with music tracks not asserted in the lawsuit. Epidemic said the information could reveal additional copyrights that Meta infringed.

The court explained that a copyright-infringement claim requires proof of ownership of a valid copyright and infringement by the defendant. Ownership is therefore a threshold issue. If the requested data identified additional copyrighted tracks, Epidemic would need permission to amend its complaint to add them. The court concluded that doing so would make the already complicated action more difficult to manage. Epidemic would need to provide registration and chain-of-title evidence for the additional works, and Meta would need to provide evidence concerning third parties that may have licensed those works to Meta.

The court also considered the time already required to obtain discovery concerning the 900 works in the case and found that allowing discovery intended to expand the number of works would cause further delay. The court was not persuaded by the cases Epidemic cited or by Epidemic’s additional evidence, which the court found concerned a different type of data export and did not show the burden that Request No. 27 would impose.

Sealing and Additional Statement

Epidemic filed an administrative motion with additional evidence and asked the court to consider sealing that evidence. The court found that the evidence contained confidential business information. It granted the motion to seal Docket No. 173-2 in part and Docket No. 173-3 in full.

Meta requested permission to submit an additional statement addressing the new evidence. The court granted that request and considered the additional statement Meta filed.

Rulings

Judge Jacquelyn Corley denied Epidemic’s motion to compel production of data for the asserted purpose of expanding the number of copyrighted works at issue. The court granted the motion to seal Docket No. 173-2 in part and Docket No. 173-3 in full, and granted Meta’s request to submit an additional statement. The order disposed of Docket Nos. 170, 173, and 174.