Can the Legal System Keep Up With AI? Music Publishers’ Anthropic Copyright Lawsuit Tentatively Set for 2026 Trial

A high-stakes case between music publishers and Anthropic is seemingly set for a 2026 trial at the earliest. Photo Credit: Steve Johnson

Is the AI space evolving too quickly for the legal system to keep up? It certainly seems so, as music publishers’ high-stakes copyright infringement litigation against Anthropic might not receive a trial until 2026. The involved parties outlined that proposed schedule in a joint case management statement yesterday, about 10 months after Universal Music Publishing Group, Concord, and other music publishers sued Amazon-backed Anthropic.

As most probably know, the straightforward-but-important suit, one of several ongoing copyright actions against generative AI developers, centers on the training process behind Anthropic’s Claude chatbot.

In short, the publisher plaintiffs say the product infringed on their protected compositions during said training process and in its outputs when responding to certain user prompts. Like other AI players, Anthropic is adamant that its training maneuvers fall under the fair use banner.

It will be a while before we have definitive answers to the significant questions raised by those clashing positions.Though many moving parts and a far-off timetable mean nothing is set in stone, the publishers themselves want a trial date between mid-March and April 1st of 2026, the aforementioned case management statement shows.

Anthropic, for its part, is calling for a slightly nearer trial that, with a start date between December 2nd of 2025 and January 13th of 2026, still wouldn’t initiate for another 16 months from now.

Particularly in light of AI’s breakneck evolution, there’s no telling what the technology will look like – or be capable of – at that point. Exactly how this affects the case (and the broader battle against AI giants) remains to be seen, but Elon Musk’s comments may be ringing true when it comes to the technology’s advancing too quickly for courtroom confrontations to keep pace.

Of course, as previously little-known companies in a heretofore seldom-discussed sector went ahead and ingested a massive chunk of the world’s protected media into their products without authorization, it’s unclear whether preemptive steps could have produced a different outcome.In any event, it’s not as if the filing-party publishers (or the plaintiffs in similar suits) are sitting idly by ahead of the sought 2026 trial. Having renewed calls for a preliminary injunction blocking Anthropic from continuing to train on their compositions and incorporating the materials into outputs, the publishers just days ago saw the RIAA submit an amicus brief in support of the push.

However this component of the case plays out, we won’t have answers overnight. Anthropic is set to outline its opposition to the preliminary injunction motion on August 22nd, with the publishers expected to reply on September 12th ahead of an October 10th hearing.

And before that, Anthropic is poised to file a dismissal motion next Thursday, August 15th.