Welcome to our Weekly Headline Roundup!
This week we’re looking at Consumer Sentiment around AI, Ticketmaster’s FTC lawsuit response, US Latin Music Market, Global Music Publishing Projections, and more.
AI Isn’t Taking Over Yet: Consumers Vehemently Oppose Machine-Generated Media, Prefer Works ‘Created by a Real Person,’ Survey Finds
Looks like the robot takeover will have to wait: According to a new survey, Americans are vehemently opposed to AI-generated entertainment, with 90% of consumers believing “it’s important to know the media they consume is created by a real person.”
– Dylan Smith, Digital Music News
This and other stats come from iHeartMedia’s AudioCon 3.0: The Human Consumer study, which the radio giant released as part of its AudioCon 2025 event yesterday. As described by iHeart, it tapped a company called Critical Mass Media to spearhead the underlying survey; north of 2,000 U.S. adults are said to have responded in August.
Ticketmaster to Ban Multiple Accounts, Shut Down TradeDesk After FTC Lawsuit
In the wake of last month’s Federal Trade Commission lawsuit, Ticketmaster has announced a major policy change, telling lawmakers that the company plans to bar fans and brokers from operating multiple accounts on its platform. Ticketmaster also plans to shut down its long-criticized TradeDesk ticket uploading application and start requiring ticket brokers to hand over their Social Security numbers in order to sell tickets on Ticketmaster’s resale platform.
– Dave Brooks, Billboard
Ticketmaster Claims in Letter to Congress That It ‘Does More Than Anyone to Get Tickets Into the Hands of Real Fans’; NIVA and NITO Do Not Agree
In a statement, the National Independent Venue Assn. wrote: “Live Nation’s ‘actions’ on resale detailed in a letter to Congress are too little and too late to get back the trust of fans, artists, and stages. They apparently got caught opening up their systems to predatory resellers, which is a betrayal of fans and artists. This looks like an attempt to clean up their devastated public image following the Federal Trade Commission’s strong BOTS Act and deceptive practices case against them. Based on that suit and this letter, we have seen clear evidence that Live Nation and Ticketmaster are in bed with scalpers, and resale platforms like StubHub and Vivid Seats benefit daily from it.
– Jem Aswad, Variety
US Latin music revenues neared $500m in H1 2025, growing 6X faster than overall US market
Amid a slowdown in the growth of US recorded music revenues, Latin music remains a bright spot.
– Daniel Tencer, Music Business Worldwide
According to the latest mid-year report from the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), Latin music wholesale revenues hit $490.3 million in the first half of 2025, up 5.9% year-over-year.
That growth rate is more than six times as fast as overall wholesale revenues in the US, which grew 0.9% YoY to $5.59 billion in H1 2025, according to an earlier report from the RIAA.
Omdia forecasts global music publishing revenue to reach $10bn by year-end
Global music publishing revenue will exceed the $10 billion mark for the first time at the end of the year, according to new data from Omdia, which estimated that global publishing revenue will register a 5.4% compound average growth rate (CAGR) over the next five years to 2030.
– Emmanuel Legrand, Creative Industries News
By 2030, the global market will reach $14.04bn, based on Omdia estimates. Total income is projected to exceed $13.0bn for the first time in 2029 and then reach the $14.0bn milestone the following year.
YouTube’s ‘twin engine of ads and subscriptions is firing on all cylinders,’ says Lyor Cohen, as platform makes $8bn+ payout to the music industry over the past year
YouTube reports that it paid more than $8 billion to the music industry during the 12 months from July 2024 to June 2025…Cohen attributed the payout to what YouTube calls its “twin-engine model,” which generates revenue through ads shown alongside free content and paid subscriptions that remove ads.
– Mandy Dalugdug, Music Business Worldwide