Short answer: Menlo Ventures principal C.C. Gong said on February 26, 2026, that she had shifted most of her listening from Spotify to Suno, then deleted the post. The anecdote could be cited against Suno’s argument that AI-generated music does not substitute for existing recorded music, but no court has ruled that the tweet proves market harm, infringement, or loss of fair-use protection.
What C.C. Gong posted—and what happened next
On February 26, 2026, C.C. Gong, a principal at Menlo Ventures and a major Suno investor, wrote that she was tired of Spotify repeatedly recommending the same music and had “personally shifted most of my listening to Suno.” She described a future in which “the catalog becomes infinite and music becomes even more personalized.”
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The language that drew attention
“Instead of competing for mainstream hits, AI unlocks an ever-expanding long tail, meaning everyone can find their song, not just a song.”
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The post was later deleted. Gong has not publicly established a reason for removing it, so the deletion itself does not show whether it reflected legal advice, a change of view, or an ordinary decision to take down a social-media post.
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Why the post is relevant to Suno’s copyright defense
Reporting on UMG Recordings, Inc. v. Suno describes a fair-use and market argument in which Suno disputes that generated outputs substitute for the licensed music allegedly used to train its models or for the recordings against which it competes. Gong’s own description of moving listening from Spotify to Suno is an obvious example of one product replacing some use of another.
How a claimant could use it
- It is a contemporaneous statement by a financially interested Suno backer, rather than an outside critic describing the product.
- It presents Suno as a destination for routine listening, not solely as a tool that complements conventional streaming.
- The “ever-expanding long tail” language describes a market in which personalized generated tracks could capture listening time that might otherwise go to recorded music.
What the tweet does not establish
- One investor’s listening behavior is not evidence of the size of Suno’s overall substitution effect.
- The post does not identify which songs were replaced, how often the change occurred, or whether Gong continued paying for Spotify.
- It does not prove that Suno infringed copyright, that training was unlawful, or that Suno’s fair-use position fails.
- No reported ruling assigns the deleted post decisive evidentiary weight.
Composer and Fairly Trained leader Ed Newton-Rex wrote that the tweet “will surely be used in court one day.” That is a prediction about possible litigation use, not a court finding.
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Where Suno’s litigation stands
UMG Recordings, Inc. v. Suno is pending in the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts. The docket and filings address allegations that copyrighted sound recordings were used in model training, Suno’s fair-use defenses, arguments about market effects, discovery, and the scope of the parties’ claims. Other copyright disputes and negotiations have also surrounded Suno.
The legal questions remain broader than one post
- Training: What recordings were copied or processed, under what circumstances, and whether that use is protected by fair use.
- Outputs and markets: Whether generated music competes with, substitutes for, or complements existing recordings and licensed streaming services.
- Evidence: How representative any individual user’s behavior or investor statement is of actual consumer demand.
The court, not a deleted social-media post, will determine what evidence is admissible and how much weight it deserves.
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Timeline of the episode and later product claim
| Date | Event | What is established |
|---|---|---|
| February 26, 2026 | Gong publishes her Suno listening post | She says she shifted most of her listening from Spotify to Suno and promotes an infinite, personalized catalog. |
| Later in 2026 | The post is deleted | No public explanation for the deletion is established. |
| September 9, 2026 | TechCrunch reports Suno’s v6 training statement | Suno says v6 was trained on licensed music and not on data used for earlier models; this is a company statement, not a judicial finding. |
Suno’s reported business scale
These figures were reported in 2026 and should be read as company or press-reported claims, not findings in the copyright case.
| Measure | Reported figure | Qualification |
|---|---|---|
| Paid subscribers | Two million | Reported from CEO Mikey Shulman’s public announcement; year 2026. |
| Annual recurring revenue | $300 million | Reported from the same public announcement; year 2026. |
| Series D financing | $400 million | Reported by TechCrunch in 2026. |
| Valuation | $5.4 billion | Reported in connection with the Series D financing; year 2026. |
Scale can make a market-impact argument more consequential, but these figures do not by themselves show how much listening Suno displaced or whether any training use was lawful.
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What Suno’s v6 statement changes—and what it does not
TechCrunch reported on September 9, 2026, that Suno said its v6 model was trained on licensed music and not on the data used for earlier models. If accurate, that describes a change in the stated provenance of v6’s training data.
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- It is Suno’s own account, not an independent audit or a court determination.
- It does not resolve allegations concerning earlier models or data.
- It does not answer whether generated outputs substitute for recorded music, the market issue highlighted by Gong’s post.
- It does not settle the pending claims, discovery disputes, or negotiations involving other rightsholders.
How to interpret the deleted tweet
- As a potentially useful admission about product positioning: Gong promoted Suno as a listening destination capable of taking time from Spotify.
- As limited evidence: Her personal behavior cannot quantify substitution across Suno’s user base.
- As a litigation talking point: Opposing lawyers may quote the post, while Suno can argue that it reflects one person’s experience and marketing language rather than a measured market study.
- As separate from training provenance: The post concerns consumer use; Suno’s later v6 announcement concerns how a model was trained. Those are different legal and factual questions.
The most defensible conclusion is narrow: Gong’s deleted post appears to conflict with a key Suno narrative that generated music does not replace existing music, making it potentially relevant in court. It does not decide the case, and Suno’s later claim about licensed data for v6 does not retroactively resolve disputes over earlier models.
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