Joe Wetzel

Joe’s recent experience includes representing:

• Perplexity as lead counsel defending multiple lawsuits brought by reference material and newspaper publishers challenging Retrieval Augmented Generative AI technology
• Meta as lead counsel defending copyright infringement claims in multiple lawsuits brought by production music library for uses on Instagram and Facebook platforms
• Together Computer in defense of copyright infringement claims brought by a putative class of book authors
• Google in defense of copyright and trademark infringement claims by academic publishers
• Anthropic as lead counsel in defeating a preliminary injunction motion by music publishers and as part of the team that secured the first-ever US court decision that training generative AI models is fair use
• The National Association of Broadcasters as lead counsel in successful resolution of industrywide proceeding to set rates for use of sound recordings by noninteractive streaming services
• OpenAI and another leading technology company in defense of copyright infringement claims by news publishers and putative classes of book authors alleging copyright infringement against generative AI technology
• The Internet Archive in successful resolution of copyright infringement claims brought by sound recording companies in connection with the Great 78 Project
• Johnson & Johnson in a software copyright infringement dispute against its main competitor for theft of source code for a medical device, which resulted in a nearly US$200 million settlement payment for J&J
• Pandora in successful summary judgment motion dismissing claims of unauthorized use by owners of old sound recordings
• A social media platform as lead counsel in successful resolution of copyright infringement claims brought by a music rights administrator after partial summary judgment win
• Shopify in successful resolution of over half a billion dollars in asserted copyright infringement claims brought by academic publishers
• The respondent as trial counsel in complete defense of arbitrated claims seeking over US$100 million in additional music license fees
• Spotify in successful resolution of concurrent, industrywide Copyright Royalty Board proceedings against music publishers to set statutory license terms for interactive streaming services from 2018-2027

Thought Leadership

Joe frequently speaks on copyright and licensing issues faced by media companies and technology platforms.

He has taught Music Law at the UC Berkeley School of Law and has guest-lectured in various internet and copyright law classes at the Bay Area’s top law schools.