Report: Impersonators Scam Fans Out of $5.3 Billion in 2025

Billboard
Jason Tate

Billboard:

Hackers impersonating celebrities like Taylor Swift and her team contributed to fleecing fans for $5.3 billion online in 2025, as AI has made online scams more successful, according to a report from social media security company Spikerz. […]

The report found that scammers target Swifties with convincing fake tickets, merch and VIP experiences, while Carpenters’ young fanbase is targeted by clone accounts offering “fake meet-and-greet offers, pre-sale links, and counterfeit merch drops.” Billie Eilish hackers have run fake livestreams or giveaways that mimic her image.

Federal Judge Dismisses MF Doom’s Trademark Suit

Legal
Jason Tate

Digital Music News:

“Temu manufactured and sold a myriad of items that are counterfeit or blatant copies of Plaintiff’s artwork, products, trademarks, and intellectual property,” the suit elaborated, also including multiple screenshots of allegedly infringing MF Doom merch listings.

From there, Temu returned fire in October with a dismissal motion that placed the alleged trademark infringement blame on the shoulders of “independent third-party sellers.”

Evidently, this argument did the trick; Judge Blumenfeld stressed the seller-marketplace distinction when doing away with the MF Doom estate’s direct infringement claim.

In the judge’s view, the plaintiff “cites no authority holding that price control renders an online marketplace a ‘seller’ liable for direct infringement,” while “the presence of Temu’s name on packaging…does not support an inference that Temu is the seller of any product, let alone the products at issue here.”

Turnstile Talk With Rolling Stone About Grammy Noms

Turnstile
Jason Tate

Turnstile talked with Rolling Stone about their historic Grammy nominations:

Genre definitely can be a good guide for finding sounds that you like in certain worlds. Hardcore is maybe more of a culture and a community. At a hardcore show, you can have bands that all sound very different, but there’s a shared essence.

We grew up going to punk and hardcore shows. And we grew up listening to rock. We grew up listening to metal, to alternative, to R&B, to rap, to electronic music. We listened to all kinds of things. We’ve never denied ourselves the musical influences that have been a part of our lives growing up, what our parents were playing when we were kids. Everyone is kind of just a sponge of what they are drawn to. I think it’s important to not put a box around what you naturally are drawn to.