The American Hockey League has been sued in the US for alleged ‘rampant’ copyright infringement of music in social media posts.
The lawsuit was filed in California on Thursday (September 12) by Associated Production Music, which is jointly owned by Sony Music Publishing and Universal Music Publishing Group (neither of which are named as plaintiffs in the suit).
The litigation arrived a week after APM filed a lawsuit against pharmaceutical giant Johnson & Johnson, also for allegedly using music in promotional videos posted to YouTube and Facebook without permission.
The lawsuit also names as defendants companies that operate nine individual teams, including the Utica Comets, Hershey Bears, Ontario Reign, Syracuse Crunch, Tucson Roadrunners, Colorado Eagles, Cleveland Monsters, Rockford IceHogs, and Belleville Senators.
As noted in APM’s lawsuit, The American Hockey League serves as the development league for the National Hockey League.
APM claims in its lawsuit that “AHL’s popularity is at an all-time high” and that “in seeking potential third-party corporate partnerships,” the AHL allegedly published a statement “discussing the importance of social media marketing.
The AHL’s statement noted that the league has an “established presence” on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, and Snapchat with over 3.25 million followers.
According to the lawsuit filed last week, and obtained by MBW, APM claims that it “became aware that AHL teams, on team-specific social media channels, had engaged in rampant infringement of the Recordings by exploiting them in connection with numerous promotional postings”.
“Moreover, despite being repeatedly contacted by APM regarding AHL’s unlicensed uses of the Recordings, AHL has refused to obtain proper licenses or admit wrongdoing.”
APM lawsuit
The lawsuit, which you can read in full here, added: “At no point in time did Defendants obtain APM’s license, authorization, or consent to synchronize the Recordings with the Infringing Videos.
“Moreover, despite being repeatedly contacted by APM regarding AHL’s unlicensed uses of the Recordings, AHL has refused to obtain proper licenses or admit wrongdoing.”
APM claims that its production music catalog is “the largest, deepest, and broadest music collection in the production music industry”.
The company says in the lawsuit and on its website that its catalog consists of multiple “diverse and in-demand production music libraries”, including KPM Music, Bruton, Sonoton, Cezame, and Kosinus.
APM notes in its lawsuit that some of its most well-known tracks are Heavy Action (a.k.a. The Theme for Monday Night Football), The Big One (a.k.a. The Theme for The People’s Court), and Sweet Victory (from the SpongeBob SquarePants episode Band of Geeks).
APM’s music has also been synced on major entertainment properties such as GLOW, This is Us, Westworld, The Americans, Stranger Things, Atlanta, Game of Thrones, SpongeBob SquarePants, The Ren & Stimpy Show, Lady Bird, Mudbound, The Disaster Artist, The Big Sick, The Shape of Water. Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare, Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon Wildlands, the Saints Row series, and MLB: The Show.
In the ‘Exhibit 1’ attachment filed with the lawsuit, APM references over 200 videos that allegedly used music without permission in videos posted to YouTube, Facebook and Instagram
Similar to the Johnson & Johnson lawsuit, the latest legal action filed by APM directs three claims against the AHL: for direct, contributory and vicarious copyright infringement.
APM seeks $150,000 in statutory damages per work infringed and also demands a jury trial.
The lawsuit filed against the American Hockey League marks the latest US-based professional sports league to be involved in litigation over the alleged use of music in promotional social media posts without permission.
In July, 14 NBA teams were hit with lawsuits in the US alleging that the pro basketball franchises used copyrighted music without permission in promo videos posted to their social media channels and on the official NBA.com website.
The lawsuits, filed by Kobalt Music Publishing, Artist Publishing Group and others, targeted some of the highest-ranked teams of the 2023-2024 season, including the New York Knicks, Cleveland Cavaliers, Denver Nuggets and Minnesota Timberwolves.
APM’s lawsuits against The American Hockey League and Johnson & Johnson also form part of a wider trend that has seen lawsuits filed by prominent players in the music business against US-based companies for allegedly using unlicensed music in promotional social media posts.
In May, for example, Sony Music Entertainment (SME) filed a lawsuit in the US against Marriott International, accusing the hotel company of “willful” infringement of copyright in social media posts.
In 2021, Sony launched a lawsuit against Gymshark, alleging that the fitness apparel brand had infringed the copyright of 297 recordings in its ads. The two companies settled the lawsuit out of court in 2022.
In November of last year, SME sued OFRA, alleging that the cosmetics brand “achieved its success through blatant, willful, and repeated copyright infringement of the sound recordings and musical compositions of various content owners” in social media posts, including “hundreds” of Sony Music’s sound recordings.Music Business Worldwide
