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German court: ChatGPT violated copyright law by ‘learning’ from song lyrics
(www.theguardian.com)
this post was submitted on 13 Nov 2025
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Unless you are performing it for others, or for profit, they generally don't care.
What if you read a copyrighted engineering textbook, and then build something for profit with that knowledge?
That's the point of a textbook.
GEMA stands for “Gesellschaft für musikalische Aufführungs- und mechanische Vervielfältigungsrechte” which means “Society for Musical Performing and Mechanical Reproduction Rights” in English. So if it’s not music they won’t care
But the court rulings / precedence wouldn't care about that distinction, it just covers learning from copyrighted material in general.
No idea about that, not a lawyer. However I think a big part is that ChatGPT would just spit out full lyrics. If you were to recreate the textbook from memory and post them online, you’d probably be in trouble too
My understanding is that it's for learning only. You should be safe for your private singing purposes. It seems like you would owe them royalties if you created your own song lyrics, after having read/heard one of theirs...
They sure would like that.
Never thought I'd hail the GEMA for what they're doing...