The Legal Beat

This is The Legal Beat, a weekly newsletter about music law from Billboard Pro, offering you a one-stop cheat sheet of big new cases, important rulings, and all the fun stuff in between. This week: Atlantic Records faces decades-old sexual assault allegations under a new statute in New York allowing long-delayed abuse cases, Taylor Swift fans sue Live Nation over last month’s Ticketmaster debacle, Guns N’ Roses files a trademark infringement case against a site that sells literal guns and roses, and much more.

THE BIG STORY: Atlantic Hit With Abuse Cases Over Founder

Atlantic Records is facing a pair of new lawsuits from women who say they were sexually assaulted by label co-founder Ahmet Ertegun in the 1980s and 1990s. And thanks to a newly-enacted statute in New York state, more such cases in the music industry could soon be on the way.Last week, former Atlantic talent scout Jan Roeg filed a case that claimed Ertegun (who died in 2006) assaulted her on their first meeting in 1983 and that his abuse then continued for “decades” after that. Naming both his estate and Atlantic itself (a unit of Warner Music Group), Roeg’s lawyers said company leadership knew about the problem but failed to take action to rein Ertegun in, thanks to a “boys will be boys” culture at the company at the time.Then on Sunday, former Atlantic A&R executive Dorothy Carvello filed a similar suit of her own, saying she had been “horrifically sexually assaulted” by Ertegun during her Atlantic tenure in the late 1980s. Carvello’s case cast a wider net, also claiming that former Atlantic co-CEO & co-chairman Doug Morris had assaulted her, and that former chairman and CEO Jason Flom had enabled the misconduct.“Executives at Atlantic Records … treated the company, its corporate headquarters, recording studios, and — even its corporate helicopter — as places to indulge their sexual desires,” Carvello’s lawyers wrote. “Employees like Ms. Carvello were the collateral damage of this toxic workplace culture.”Though the lawsuits are new, the allegations are not. In her memoir Anything for a Hit, Carvello made similar accusations against Ertegun and has since become a relentless voice calling for accountability in the music industry over what she alleges are longstanding patterns of abuse and attempts to silence victims. She’s even purchased stock in all three major record companies, aiming to use shareholder status “to bring more transparency to the music industry,” she told Billboard at the time.Both of the cases against Atlantic were filed under the New York’s Adult Survivors Act, a new statute enacted in May that created a one-year window for alleged abuse victims to file long-delayed lawsuits that would normally be barred by the statute of limitations. Advocates said the law was needed because the trauma of sexual assault and fear of retaliation often prevent abuse victims from seeking justice within traditional time limits.The ASA’s one-year window only went into effect on Nov. 24, and there’s reason to believe that many more cases could be coming before the law expires in a year. When New York passed a similar law in 2019 covering victims of childhood sexual abuse, CNN reported that nearly 11,000 suits were eventually filed during a 2-year window. And it seems unlikely those cases won’t include other decades-old allegations against former executives in the music industry.“The ‘sex, drugs, and Rock n’ Roll’ culture in the music industry at companies like Atlantic Records was taken as license by powerful men like Ahmet Ertegun to engage in sexual assault and other abuse of women,” said Lawrence M. Pearson, Roeg’s lawyer at the firm Wigdor LLP, in a statement when that case was filed. “Now, Ms. Roeg and other survivors of sexual assault who in past years were forced into silence due to the threat of retaliation or loss of their careers can get justice under the Adult Survivors Act.”

Other top stories this week…

TAYLOR FANS v. TICKETMASTER – More than two dozen Taylor Swift fans filed a lawsuit against Live Nation over Ticketmaster’s botched sale of tickets to her Eras Tour last month, the first known case filed over the fiasco. Mostly repeating existing gripes about the concert giant’s “anticompetitive” control of the live music industry, the case also alleged a veritable kitchen sink of other wrongdoing, including intentionally misleading fans about the amount of tickets that would be available and failing to take action against bots.CLASH OVER COVID CASH – Can you sue somebody for copying your “novel idea” that artists might be eligible for federal COVID relief funds? We’re about to find out. In a new lawsuit, a longtime music agent named Laurence Leader accused talent manager Michael Oppenheim of stealing his idea to help musical artists tap into Shuttered Venue Operators Grants — a COVID-era federal program designed primarily to help venues, not musicians. Leader says that after he disclosed the concept to Oppenheim in strict confidence, the rival used the same scheme to secure more than $200 million in SVOG funds for Vampire Weekend, Marshmello, Common, Lil Wayne and many others — something the lawsuit deemed “despicable” and an “outright betrayal.”BILLION DOLLAR BOOZE BATTLE – Jay-Z’s nasty dispute with Bacardi over their D’Usse Cognac brand might be bigger than we thought. In sealed filings made public last week, the rapper’s lawyers disclosed that Jay-Z previously demanded that Bacardi pay him $2.5 billion for his half of the business; that the rapper had offered to pay $1.5 billion to instead buy out Bacardi’s half; and that disputed internal forecasts showed D’Usse selling 2 million cases of cognac and earning $142.8 million annually by 2026. But it might be a while before we get a final outcome: The sprawling case is currently mired in procedural bickering between the two sides, spread across four lawsuits in two different states as well as a private arbitration proceeding.LITERAL GUNS AND ROSES – Guns N’ Roses filed a lawsuit against a gun retailer that’s using the name “Texas Guns and Roses,” arguing that the name infringes the band’s trademark rights — and that the band members especially don’t want to be associated with firearms or “polarizing” political views. The band said the Houston-based company “espouses political views related to the regulation and control of firearms and weapons on the website that may be polarizing to many U.S. consumers.” The site claims to sell literal roses, but GNR’s lawsuit called that a “contrivance” to justify the name theft.MAN WHO SHOT GAGA’S DOG WALKER GETS 21 YEARS – James Howard Jackson, the man who shot Lady Gaga’s dog walker and stole her French bulldogs last year, took a plea deal and was sentenced to 21 years in prison. Jackson, one of three men and two accomplices who participated in the violent robbery, pleaded no contest to one count of attempted murder. Prosecutors said the connection to Gaga was entirely coincidental and that the perpetrators were simply seeking to steal valuable bulldogs, which can cost thousands of dollars.FREEPLAY SAYS MUSIC ISN’T, AH, FREE TO PLAY – Freeplay Music, a company that sells so-called production music for use with video content, filed a copyright lawsuit against CNN that claims the cable news giant used more than 100 different songs in international segments without paying for them. Calling it infringement on a “breathtaking scale,” the Freeplay demanded at least $17 million in damages – the maximum in so-called statutory damages for every song infringed. The case is one of dozens of infringement lawsuits Freeplay has filed over the years, drawing criticism that the company is more interested in “extracting settlements” than actually selling music.ASTROWORLD LITIGATION UPDATE – More than a year into litigation over the deadly Astroworld music festival, attorneys for the event’s organizers told the judge overseeing the case that nearly 1,000 fans who sued over their alleged injuries have ignored discovery deadlines and failed to hand over “critical evidence.” With roughly 2,500 alleged victims still in the case, attorneys for the defendants in the case — Live Nation, Travis Scott, Apple and many others involved in the festival – warned that 956 of them had “not provided any response whatsoever” to basic requests for information: “There is no excuse for the non-responsive plaintiffs’ complete disregard of their discovery obligations.”

This is The Legal Beat, a weekly newsletter about music law from Billboard Pro, offering you a one-stop cheat sheet of big new cases, important rulings, and all the fun stuff in between. This week: A murder case against rapper YNW Melly turns into an appellate battle over the death penalty, Phoebe Bridgers defeats a producer’s defamation lawsuit, Megan Thee Stallion wins a restraining order against her label, and much more.

THE BIG STORY: YNW Melly Could Face Death Penalty

Three years after he was arrested and charged with first-degree murder, YNW Melly has found himself at the center of a legal battle over the death penalty, with a trip to the Florida Supreme Court looming next.If you haven’t been following: Melly (real name Jamell Demons) faces two counts of murder over accusations that he and another rapper, YNW Bortlen, shot and killed Anthony “YNW Sakchaser” Williams and Christopher “YNW Juvy” Thomas Jr. in 2018.A first-degree murder defendant in Florida would typically face the possibility of execution if convicted. But earlier this year, Melly’s attorneys argued that the state had forfeited the right to seek capital punishment by failing to comply with strict laws on how they must warn defendants that they’ll do so.Florida requires prosecutors to give notice 45 days after arraignment if they plan to seek capital punishment. In Melly’s case, the state attorney filed such notice when they originally indicted the rapper in 2019, but they then failed to do so when they re-charged him with a so-called superseding indictment earlier this year. In July, a state trial judge sided with Melly’s lawyers, taking the death penalty off the table.But in a ruling last week, a state appeals court overturned that decision. Since prosecutors gave notice that they might seek death when they first charged him, the court said they had complied with state rules – and more importantly, had avoided the due process problems the rules were designed to safeguard against.“Notice is notice,” the court wrote in its opinion. “The defendant has had nearly three years to start the preparation of his defense to the state seeking the death penalty [and] the record contains no evidence that the defendant was prejudiced in any way.”The ruling likely won’t be the last on Melly’s case. In handing down its decision, the appeals court certified that the case dealt with novel legal questions that are of “great public importance” to the state of Florida – meaning they should be decided by the state’s Supreme Court.In a statement to Billboard, Melly’s attorney Philip R. Horowitz said he and his client were “disappointed in the ruling” but “look forward to our opportunity to argue our position before the justices.”

Other top stories this week…

PHOEBE SLAPPS DOWN LAWSUIT – A Los Angeles judge tossed out a lawsuit against Phoebe Bridgers that accused her of defaming producer/studio owner Chris Nelson, citing California’s anti-SLAPP law that’s designed to protect free speech against questionable lawsuits. Nelson’s lawsuit claimed that Bridgers lied about him in a series of October 2020 Instagram posts, in which the singer amplified accusations of abuse made against him by another woman. Her lawyers then fired back that Nelson was just using the lawsuit to “chill Ms. Bridgers’ allegations of abusive conduct, which are protected by the First Amendment.” Though Judge Curtis A. Kin sided with that argument last week, he did not issue a written ruling explaining the decision. Nelson has already vowed to appeal; a rep for Bridgers said the star felt “vindicated that the court recognized this lawsuit as frivolous and without merit.”MEGAN THEE PLAINTIFF – A judge in Texas sided with Megan Thee Stallion and granted her a restraining order against her record label 1501 Certified Entertainment, issued after she claimed that the company “unlawfully” took steps “to block or interfere” with her ability to use her music in the lead-up to the AMAs on Sunday. The order bars the company from “preventing or blocking the use and exploitation” of Megan’s music in promotional content for the AMAs. The tussle ahead of the awards show is the latest front in a years-long legal war between Megan and 1501. She claims the label duped her into signing an unfair contract and has retaliated against her for challenging it; the company claims Megan, with the help of Jay-Z’s Roc Nation, is using baseless litigation merely as a vehicle to escape a deal she “no longer likes.”YE SUED YET AGAIN – Kanye West is facing a new copyright lawsuit over allegations that his “Life of the Party” illegally sampled from 1986 song “South Bronx” by the pioneering rap group Boogie Down Productions. The company that currently owns BDP’s copyrights says West’s people reached out to clear the sample, but then released it anyway when a deal was never struck. The case is the latest in a string of such infringement case against the embattled rapper, who (amid many, many other problems) has been repeatedly sued for failing to secure licenses for samples.THEIR LOSS? – Just days after Condé Nast sued Drake and 21 Savage for using a fake cover story in Vogue magazine to promote their new album Her Loss, a federal judge issued a restraining order forcing them to stop using it. The judge ruled that the cover – one of several fake promos for the album – was likely violating the publisher’s trademarks because Drake and 21 were “misleading consumers” and “deceiving the public.” DJ SUED FOR NFT PROFITS – 3LAU was hit with a lawsuit claiming the DJ refused to properly share the earnings from an $11 million NFT auction with Luna Aura, a musical collaborator who co-authored one of the songs involved. Aura claims she owns a 50% royalty stake in the song “Walk Away” from his album Ultraviolet — but that 3LAU (real name Justin Blau) offered her just $25,000 from the much-publicized NFT auction tied to the record: “Despite this financial windfall, defendants only offered Luna Aura a flat one-time payment.” 3LAU’s reps said the case was “without merit” and came as a surprise after months of negotiations.BANKROLL FREDDIE ARRESTED – Rapper Bankroll Freddie (Freddie Gladney III) was arrested in Arkansas on federal gun and drug charges, part of a sweeping bust across the state that saw 80 defendants indicted and 45 arrested, including his father Freddie Gladney Jr. The rapper, signed to Quality Control, is facing 11 total charges, including various drug possessions and possession of a machine gun.

This is The Legal Beat, a weekly newsletter about music law from Billboard Pro, offering you a one-stop cheat sheet of big new cases, important rulings, and all the fun stuff in between. This week: Drake is sued for using a fake Vogue cover story to promote his new album, the sprawling lawsuit over Astroworld passes the one-year mark with no quick end in sight, Mariah Carey beats a lawsuit over “All I Want For Christmas Is You” and much more.

THE BIG STORY: Vogue Isn’t Laughing About Drake’s PR Stunt

A publicity stunt is all fun and games until somebody gets sued.For the past week, Drake and 21 Savage have been on a media blitz to promote their new album Her Loss, which debuted Friday. The stars appeared on the cover of an issue of Vogue magazine, performed on Saturday Night Live, teased an appearance on NPR’s Tiny Desk and sat for an interview on The Howard Stern Show.Just one problem: All of those appearances were fake. The Vogue covers were photoshopped onto fake issues distributed around the country (Jennifer Lawrence was on the real October issue); the SNL performance was a spoof, with a high-profile assist from Michael B. Jordan as the fake “host”; NPR quickly confirmed the Tiny Desk show wasn’t happening; and the Stern appearance was an elaborate deepfake.The whole thing appears to be a publicity stunt, carried out by an artist who doesn’t really need to do promo for his album releases and hasn’t done so in recent years — but would be eagerly invited to actually appear on those outlets if he wanted to go that route.Case in point: NPR used the stunt as an opportunity to tell the star he was “welcome anytime” on the beloved concert series: “Let’s do it forreal tho.” And Stern laughed the whole thing off, jokingly quipping about the convincing deepfake version of himself: “Whenever I have to visit my mother, I wish I could do this.” No word from SNL, but a show famous for parody is unlikely to be offended.The same cannot be said for Vogue publisher Condé Nast, which filed a lawsuit against Drake and 21 in New York federal court this week that called the stunt a “flagrant infringement” of the company’s trademark rights, aimed at exploiting the “tremendous value that a cover feature in Vogue magazine carries” without actually securing that honor.The publisher seemed particularly miffed by Drake’s Instagram post teasing the fake cover story, in which he personally thanked famed Vogue editor Anna Wintour. The infamous magazine editor “had no involvement” with Drake’s album and has “not endorsed it in any way,” Condé’s lawyers wrote.If the case doesn’t immediately settle with Drake pulling down the images (a strong possibility in any trademark case) Condé’s lawsuit could lead to an interesting debate over parody. Is Drake’s stunt a commentary on the way media outlets like Vogue or SNL (or Billboard, for that matter) team up with celebrities to help them promote their latest offerings? Or is he just exploiting their names to pump sales of his album without actually doing the hard work of a press tour?

The Other Big Story: Astroworld Update

A year on from the deadly disaster at Travis Scott‘s Astroworld festival, Billboard took a deep dive into the status of the sprawling lawsuit that’s been filed by victims.More than 4,900 legal claims have been filed against Live Nation, Scott and other festival organizers, accusing them of being legally negligent in how they planned and conducted the event. Combined, the cases are seeking billions in damages over the disaster.With no quick ending in sight, we asked some of the country’s top experts in such cases: Where do things stand? What comes next? And how will it all end? Read the whole thing here.

Other top stories this week…

RECORD LABELS WIN BIG PIRACY VERDICT – A federal jury in Texas ordered internet service provider Grande Communications to pay more than $46 million in damages to the three major record labels and others over music illegally downloaded by the company’s subscribers. The case was one of several filed by music companies against ISPs, aimed at forcing them to take more proactive steps to eliminate piracy on their networks — the same kind of case that ended with a shocking $1 billion verdict against Cox Communications in 2019.OBSCURE RULE IS BIG WIN FOR SONGWRITERS – As first reported by Billboard last week, the U.S. Copyright Office is quietly proposing a new rule to make sure that songwriters who invoke their termination rights actually get paid their streaming royalties. The rule change would overturn a previous “erroneous” policy by the Mechanical Licensing Collective that critics worried could potentially have kept sending such money to former owners in perpetuity, even after a songwriter has reclaimed their rights. Groups like the Recording Academy and the Songwriters of North America, which lobbied for the rule change, praised it as a win for songwriters.MARIAH CAREY ‘CHRISTMAS’ ACCUSER DROPS CASE – Vince Vance, a songwriter who sued Mariah Carey over accusations that she stole her “All I Want for Christmas is You” from his earlier song of the same name, dropped his lawsuit over Carey’s 1994 holiday blockbuster. But he dismissed the case “without prejudice,” leaving open the possibility that he could refile the case at some point in the future. If you’re confused why Carey can be sued over a decades-old song, go read our explainer on the issue (spoiler: because the Supreme Court said so!) Though legally dubious, Vance’s case was a big deal simply because Carey’s song is a big deal: It has reached No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 during each of the past three holiday seasons.KESHA & DR. LUKE GET A TRIAL DATE – A New York judge scheduled a July trial for Dr. Luke’s defamation lawsuit against Kesha, setting the stage for a courtroom showdown nearly nine years after the case was first filed. A trial had previously been scheduled to start in February, but with key issues in the case still awaiting rulings by a state appeals court, both sides saw that plan as unworkable (and blamed the other for the delay). If you’ve forgotten: Dr. Luke is accusing Kesha of defaming him with a “false and shocking” allegation that he drugged and raped her after a 2005 party.

The best of the rest…

–Kanye West paid a settlement to a former employee who alleged having witnessed more than one incident in which the once-beloved rapper praised Hitler or Nazis in business meetings. In the settlement agreement, West denied the claims made by the former employee. (NBC News)-The U.S. Supreme Court said it wouldn’t hear music producer Gary “G-Money” Frisby’s copyright suit against Sony Music and rapper Bryson Tiller over beats on Tiller’s album Trapsoul. (Law360)–Trey Songz won the dismissal of a $20 million sexual assault lawsuit that had been filed, dismissed and then re-filed by a Jane Doe accuser. A judge ruled that the accuser missed a key deadline to respond to Songz’s defense that the statute of limitations on her allegations had expired. (Rolling Stone)

This is The Legal Beat, a weekly column about music law from Billboard Pro, offering you a one-stop cheat sheet of big new cases, important rulings, and all the fun stuff in between.
This week: Cardi B goes to trial in a weird case over a bawdy album cover, Gunna is again refused bond in Atlanta, Ed Sheeran warns that a copyright ruling might “strangle” future songwriters and much more.

THE BIG STORY: Cardi Heads to Trial Over Bawdy Album Cover

In one of the weirder cases you’ll ever hear about, Cardi B is headed to a federal courthouse today to defend against claims that the cover of her debut mixtape “humiliated” a man named Kevin Brophy, who alleges he was unwittingly photoshopped into the artwork to make it look like he was performing oral sex on the now-superstar.Yes, you read that right. And I didn’t even tell you yet that the entire thing hinges on a giant back tattoo featuring “a tiger battling a snake.”As Cardi’s star was rising in 2016, she released Gangsta Bitch Music Vol. 1 with a provocative cover – an image of her swigging a beer, staring into the camera … with a man’s head between her legs. The actual guy in the image was a model (who consented to the whole thing), but the giant tattoo on his back belonged to Brophy (who didn’t). Unbeknownst to Cardi, a freelance graphic designer had typed “back tattoos” into Google Image, found one that fit, and Photoshopped it onto the model’s body. It apparently didn’t occur to him that he would need anyone’s approval to do so.Years later, the two will now square off before a jury over whether the image broke the law, and whether Cardi herself is to blame.Brophy claims the star and others violated his right of publicity by using his likeness without his consent, and also invasion of his privacy by casting him in a “false light” that was “highly offensive” to a reasonable person. He claims he was “devastated, humiliated and embarrassed” by the cover.Cardi says those accusations are “sheer fantasy” and “vastly overblown.” Her legal team says Cardi had no idea Brophy’s image was being used, and that he’s just suing her in an effort to “cash in the legal equivalent of a lotto ticket.” But their chief argument is even simpler: That nobody would have ever recognized a relatively unknown person based on a cropped image of his back tattoo.“No matter how much plaintiff may be obsessed with the notion, the fact remains that it is not  ‘him,’ or a ‘likeness of him,’ or ‘his identity’ in the cover image,” Cardi’s lawyers wrote.Cardi is expected to testify at some point, with a verdict expected by the end of the week or early next week. We’ll keep you posted over at Billboard.com when the news drops.

Other top stories this week…

VLOGGER BETTER HAVE MY MONEY – Elsewhere in Cardi-world, a federal judge ruled that Tasha K – a gossip blogger who made salacious claims about the star – must either immediately pay up on an almost $4 million defamation verdict or secure a bond covering the entire amount. Tasha is currently appealing the verdict and wanted to pause the judgement while she does so, but Cardi’s lawyers warned last month that the YouTuber had bragged about taking steps to “insulate herself” from the huge damages award, and might use the delay to avoid paying entirely.GUNNA DENIED BOND YET AGAIN – For a third time, a Georgia judge refused to release Gunna from jail ahead of his January trial in the sweeping case against Young Thug and others accused of operating a violent gang in the Atlanta area. The order came after prosecutors claimed to have text messages in which a co-defendant in the sprawling case offered to “whack someone” on the rapper’s behalf, prompting the judge to say that he had the “same concerns” about the potential for witness tampering. But just a day later, Gunna’s lawyers cried foul, claiming the alleged smoking gun text actually had “nothing to do with witness intimidation” and had been used to mislead the court.SHOTS FIRED OVER POWERHOUSE MUSIC LAWYER – In an exclusive interview with Billboard’s Frank DiGiacomo, Rolling Stone founder Jann Wenner blasted the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame for its upcoming induction of powerhouse music lawyer Allen Grubman, saying it was “about money and bending to the ego of a music business power broker.” Grubman is one of the most powerful attorneys in the industry, counting Bruce Springsteen, Lizzo, The Weeknd, Lil Nas X, Lady Gaga and other stars as clients, as well as major music companies and digital streamers. But Wenner said he decided to speak out because he believes Grubman clearly doesn’t fit the criteria: “Grubman has made no contribution of any kind, by any definition, to the creative development or the history of rock & roll.”WARHOL & PRINCE AT SCOTUS – More than three decades after Andy Warhol‘s death and six years after Prince‘s sudden passing, the two pop culture icons took center stage at U.S. Supreme Court , as the justices heard arguments in a major copyright case. At issue in the dispute is whether the late Warhol made a legal “fair use” of a photograph of Prince when he used it as the basis for a set of his distinctive screen prints – or merely infringed the copyrights of Lynn Goldsmith, the photographer who snapped it. During the proceedings, the justices grappled with tough questions, like what exactly is necessary to “transform” a copyrighted work into a fair use. In a lighter moment, Justice Clarence Thomas disclosed that he had been a fan of Prince’s music “in the ’80s,” to which Justice Elena Kagan asked “no longer?” As the room erupted in laughter, Thomas replied enigmatically: “Only on Thursday night.”ED SHEERAN WARNS OF ‘STRANGLED’ SONGWRITERS – The pop star’s lawyers asked a federal judge to rethink a recent decision that said the singer must face a trial over whether “Thinking Out Loud” infringes Marvin Gaye‘s “Let’s Get It On.” The decision came two weeks after Judge Louis Stanton refused to toss the case out, ruling that a jury would have to decide Sheeran’s argument that he only borrowed basic, unprotectable musical “building blocks.” In the new filing, the star’s lawyers warned the judge that forcing musicians to face trials over such material would have a chilling effect on the industry and threaten to “strangle creation” by future songwriters. In technical terms, Sheeran’s attorneys want the judge to either undo the ruling entirely, or allow them to immediately appeal it before he faces trial.SLACKER HIT WITH HUGE UNPAID ROYALTY BILL – A federal judge ruled that streaming platform Slacker owes nearly $10 million in unpaid performance royalties to record labels and artists. SoundExchange, which collects streaming royalties for sound recordings, sued Slacker and parent company LiveOne in June, claiming they had refused to pay millions over a five-year period. This week, Judge André Birotte Jr. made it official, ordering that Slacker pay $9,765,396 in unpaid royalties and late fees. Importantly, he also banned the company from using the so-called statutory license – a key copyright provision that allows radio-like streamers to get easy access to licenses at a fixed rate. Now, Slacker will presumably need to negotiate direct licenses from rights holders for sound recordings, similar to what on-demand streaming services like Spotify must do.