BIG TECH, BIG MONEY, BIG QUESTIONS: WHO REALLY PROTECTS THE PEOPLE CREATING THE CONTENT?

S.M.A.C.C. NEWS DESK | Friday, 23 October 2026

Privacy, copyright, artificial intelligence, fraudulent advertising and the growing struggle for accountability in the digital economy.

A $25 billion judgment against Meta. New questions about whether social-media companies can access content on independently operated websites. Fresh allegations about fraudulent advertising. And an important copyright victory for a songwriter.

These stories may appear unrelated.

But they all raise a fundamental question:

When technology companies build enormous businesses around people’s information, creativity and audiences, who protects the individuals making those businesses possible?

Welcome to this week’s S.M.A.C.C. News Desk.

IN THIS EDITION

  • Meta faces a $25 billion privacy judgment: A US court imposes an extraordinary financial penalty following findings about Facebook’s handling of personal information.
  • Your website, Meta’s rules? Publishers challenge new commercial terms concerning automated access to websites associated with business accounts.
  • Meta sued over fraudulent advertising: Rhode Island alleges the company profited from scam advertisements, including deceptive AI-generated promotions.
  • A songwriter’s copyright victory: A US Supreme Court decision leaves standing an important ruling about recovering previously transferred creative rights.
  • Anthropic and AI copyright: Music publishers challenge the use of copyrighted lyrics in artificial intelligence training.
  • Independent filmmaking and copyright: A filmmaker loses her appeal in a dispute involving Apple and M. Night Shyamalan.
  • The BBC and defamation: A major lawsuit highlights the legal and ethical consequences of misleading video editing.
  • The future of filmmaking: Vertical dramas are creating new opportunities — and new commercial questions — for independent producers.

1. META’S $25 BILLION PRIVACY JUDGMENT: CAN TRUST BE REBUILT?

One of the most extraordinary legal developments of the week concerns Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram.

A court in New Mexico has ordered Meta to pay $25 billion following findings that Facebook misled consumers about the privacy of their personal information.

The proceedings stem from the Cambridge Analytica scandal, which exposed serious questions about how Facebook user information could be obtained and used by third parties.

The jury found millions of violations of New Mexico’s consumer-protection legislation.

The judge calculated that the statutory penalties could potentially have been considerably higher before reducing the award to $25 billion.

Meta disputes the decision and intends to appeal.

This is therefore a judgment subject to further legal challenge, not a final payment already made.

Why should independent creators care?

Because social-media platforms are no longer simply places where people exchange messages and photographs.

For many independent creators, they are essential commercial infrastructure.

A photographer may depend on Instagram to attract customers.

A filmmaker may use Facebook to promote a production.

A journalist may rely on social-media distribution to reach an audience.

A small business may have invested years in developing its online community.

All of these activities involve trust.

Creators and their audiences need to understand how personal information is collected, shared and used.

They also need confidence that the privacy controls provided by platforms mean what they appear to mean.

The case raises a question extending well beyond Facebook’s historical conduct.

If a platform cannot clearly explain how it handles personal information, how can its users make informed decisions about using it?

And if something goes wrong, how quickly and effectively can the law provide a remedy?

A financial penalty of this magnitude attracts attention.

But genuine accountability ultimately depends on what changes as a result.

2. YOUR WEBSITE, META’S AI? THE NEW BATTLE OVER CONTENT RIGHTS

For independent content creators, this may be the most practically important story in today’s edition.

A coalition representing digital publishers and advertisers has challenged revised Meta commercial terms scheduled to take effect on 30 October.

The dispute concerns provisions permitting automated access to websites associated with businesses using Meta’s services.

Critics argue that the terms could give Meta excessive influence over content published outside its own platforms.

Earlier wording referred explicitly to training Meta products. Following objections, that reference was removed.

Meta says the changes do not alter its existing crawling practices and do not override website owners’ technical preferences expressed through robots.txt.

Nevertheless, complaints have been submitted to the European Commission and the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority.

Why does this matter?

Imagine that you are an independent photographer.

You operate your own website containing thousands of original photographs.

You also maintain an Instagram business account because that is where many potential customers discover your work.

You created the photographs.

You paid for the website.

You own or control the relevant rights.

But should your commercial relationship with a social-media platform give that company additional permission to access material published on your independently operated website?

Now consider an independent journalist.

The journalist publishes original investigations on a personal website and uses Facebook to distribute links.

Or a filmmaker who promotes trailers on Instagram but hosts original productions elsewhere.

Should participation in one commercial platform affect the rights and controls associated with content published somewhere else?

There is an important legal distinction here.

Permission to crawl or analyse a website does not automatically establish an unrestricted right to reproduce copyrighted material or use it for every possible AI-training purpose.

Contractual permissions, copyright law and technical restrictions are separate issues.

But the underlying concern remains.

Is consent meaningful when there is little practical alternative?

Many small businesses feel commercially obliged to maintain a presence on major social-media platforms.

They may technically be free to reject new terms by ceasing to use a service.

But doing so could mean losing access to customers, audiences and years of accumulated goodwill.

That raises an uncomfortable question.

How freely can a small creator negotiate with a platform on which their livelihood depends?

The dispute is not yet resolved.

However, it illustrates why independent creators need to pay attention to platform terms, copyright permissions and the controls governing their own websites.

The most valuable digital asset a creator possesses may not be a social-media account.

It may be the original work that account was created to promote.

3. WHO PROFITS WHEN THE ADVERTISEMENT IS A SCAM?

Meta is also facing fresh legal proceedings in Rhode Island.

The state’s Attorney General alleges that the company knowingly facilitated and profited from fraudulent advertising across Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp.

The lawsuit includes allegations concerning misleading financial promotions, deceptive health claims and advertisements impersonating individuals or established organisations.

It also raises questions about the use of artificial intelligence to generate convincing fraudulent advertising.

Meta denies the allegations.

The company says it has removed substantial numbers of scam advertisements and invested in measures designed to identify fraudulent activity.

These are allegations in ongoing proceedings, not established findings of wrongdoing.

Why this matters to creators

Fraudulent advertising does not only harm the people who lose money.

It can also damage the reputations and livelihoods of legitimate content creators.

Consider an influencer whose photograph is used to promote an investment scheme they have never endorsed.

Or a filmmaker whose name appears in a misleading advertisement.

Or a small business competing against advertisers making claims that legitimate businesses would never make.

AI adds another complication.

A fraudulent advertisement can now be made to look more professional, more personalised and potentially more convincing.

Synthetic voices, manipulated images and fabricated endorsements can create the impression that trusted people support products they know nothing about.

The result is a problem for the entire creator economy.

Trust is a commercial asset. When fraudulent advertisers undermine that trust, legitimate creators suffer too.

There is also a question of responsibility.

Advertising platforms earn revenue from the advertisements they distribute.

How far should their obligations extend when an advertisement turns out to be fraudulent?

What systems should exist to prevent repeated abuse?

And how quickly should platforms act when someone discovers that their image, identity or reputation is being exploited?

These are questions that regulators, courts and technology companies will increasingly have to confront.

4. A SONGWRITER’S COPYRIGHT VICTORY: CAN CREATORS TAKE BACK THEIR WORK?

Away from Meta, an important American copyright dispute has reached a significant stage.

The US Supreme Court has declined to hear an appeal involving songwriter Cyril Vetter and the rights to Double Shot (Of My Baby’s Love).

The dispute concerned whether certain rights previously transferred to music publishers could be recovered under American copyright law, including rights associated with exploitation outside the United States.

A federal appeals court ruled in Vetter’s favour.

By declining to hear the publishers’ appeal, the Supreme Court has left that ruling standing.

That does not mean the Supreme Court has issued a new judgment approving every aspect of the lower court’s reasoning.

But the result remains significant.

Why should creators pay attention?

Many musicians, photographers, writers and filmmakers sign commercial agreements early in their careers.

At that stage, their work may have limited financial value.

A creator may accept a modest payment in exchange for rights that subsequently become extremely valuable.

Years later, the creator may discover that other organisations continue to profit from the work.

American copyright law contains particular provisions allowing some creators to terminate historic transfers.

Those provisions are subject to detailed conditions and do not apply automatically to every agreement or jurisdiction.

Nevertheless, the principle is important.

A creator’s relationship with their work does not necessarily end forever when they sign a publishing agreement.

This is particularly relevant at a time when digital distribution and artificial intelligence are creating new commercial uses for existing creative material.

A song written decades ago may find a new audience.

A photograph may be licensed internationally.

An old film may be redistributed through streaming services.

And creative works may become commercially valuable in ways their original authors never anticipated.

The lesson for independent creators is straightforward.

Understand what rights you are transferring.

Understand how long the transfer lasts.

And understand whether any legal mechanisms may allow those rights to return to you.

5. ANTHROPIC AND MUSIC PUBLISHERS: CAN AI LEARN FROM COPYRIGHTED LYRICS?

The debate over artificial intelligence and copyright continues in the United States.

Anthropic, the company behind Claude, is defending its use of copyrighted song lyrics in AI development.

Major music publishers argue that using protected lyrics without permission infringes their rights and potentially damages the market for human-created material.

Anthropic argues that training its AI systems can constitute transformative fair use under American law.

A California federal court has heard competing arguments, but the hearing did not produce a final ruling on the central questions.

Why this matters

There is a fundamental difference between using a creative work to develop an AI system and generating an output that reproduces protected material.

Both may raise legal questions, but they are not necessarily governed by identical considerations.

For independent creators, the wider issue is compensation and control.

Should AI companies obtain permission before using copyrighted works?

Should creators receive payment?

And how should the law distinguish learning from existing material from reproducing somebody else’s protected expression?

Recent commercial licensing agreements demonstrate that payment arrangements are possible.

But the legal boundaries remain contested.

Until those boundaries become clearer, creators face considerable uncertainty about how their work may be used.

6. INDEPENDENT FILMMAKING: WHEN DOES INSPIRATION BECOME COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT?

An American appeals court has upheld a verdict in favour of Apple and filmmaker M. Night Shyamalan in a copyright dispute involving the television series Servant.

Independent filmmaker Francesca Gregorini had alleged that the series copied elements of her film The Truth About Emanuel.

A jury found in favour of the defendants.

The appeals court rejected challenges to aspects of the trial and allowed the verdict to stand.

The wider lesson

Creative works frequently share themes, settings, character types and storytelling conventions.

But similarity alone does not establish copyright infringement.

Copyright generally protects original expression rather than every underlying idea.

For independent filmmakers, this distinction is critical.

It is entirely possible to believe that another production resembles your work without having a legally successful copyright claim.

The case also demonstrates the difficulty and expense of litigating creative disputes against major commercial organisations.

Creators should maintain clear records of their work, contracts, ownership and development history.

But they should also understand the limits of copyright protection.

7. THE BBC, DONALD TRUMP AND THE RESPONSIBILITY OF VIDEO EDITORS

A US federal judge has ordered President Donald Trump to give evidence in his defamation lawsuit against the BBC.

The case concerns a documentary that combined excerpts from Trump’s speech on 6 January 2021 in a way that created a misleading impression of his remarks.

The BBC acknowledged the editing problem and apologised, while disputing that it is legally liable for defamation.

The latest court order concerns the gathering of evidence before trial.

It does not establish the outcome of the lawsuit.

Why this matters to every video creator

Editing is an essential part of filmmaking and journalism.

Every documentary involves selecting, shortening and arranging material.

But editing can also alter meaning.

Removing context, combining remarks from different moments or making separate statements appear continuous can create a misleading impression.

For independent creators publishing news, interviews or documentary content, the distinction between editing for clarity and editing in a misleading way is fundamental.

Just because technology allows an editor to create a particular sequence does not mean that sequence fairly represents what happened.

This is precisely where creative freedom meets editorial responsibility.

And it is a subject that deserves continuing attention as AI makes the manipulation of audio and video increasingly sophisticated.

8. IS THE FUTURE OF FILMMAKING VERTICAL?

The growing popularity of phone-first entertainment is creating new opportunities for independent filmmakers.

At New York’s Alza microdrama festival, filmmakers explored the possibilities of producing scripted entertainment designed primarily for vertical viewing.

Short episodes, mobile-first storytelling and relatively inexpensive production methods are attracting attention.

For independent producers, the potential advantages are obvious.

Smaller crews.

Lower production costs.

Direct access to mobile audiences.

And opportunities to experiment with formats that traditional broadcasters might reject.

But commercial success is not guaranteed.

Producing inexpensive content does not necessarily mean finding a profitable audience.

Distribution, marketing, production quality and platform dependence remain significant challenges.

Vertical filmmaking is an emerging opportunity rather than a guaranteed replacement for conventional television or cinema.

For creators willing to experiment, however, it is a development worth watching.

THE BIGGER PICTURE: WHO REALLY OWNS THE DIGITAL ECONOMY?

There is a common thread running through all these stories.

A photographer creates an image.

A musician writes a song.

A filmmaker produces a documentary.

A journalist publishes an investigation.

An influencer develops a loyal audience.

Technology companies provide powerful tools to distribute, promote and monetise that work.

But the relationship is not always equal.

Platforms establish the terms.

Algorithms influence distribution.

Advertising systems determine much of the commercial opportunity.

And increasingly, artificial intelligence creates new ways to analyse, reproduce and derive value from existing material.

The creator often has comparatively little influence over those decisions.

That does not mean technology companies provide no value.

Without digital platforms, many independent creators would never have reached international audiences.

Social media, online video and AI tools have created extraordinary opportunities.

But opportunity and accountability must develop together.

The question is not whether technology companies should be allowed to innovate or make money.

It is whether the people whose creativity, information and audiences make those businesses possible receive fair treatment, meaningful choices and effective protection.

The courts are increasingly being asked to address those questions.

Regulators are examining commercial terms and competition.

Creators are challenging how their work is used.

And audiences are becoming more aware of the relationship between convenience, privacy and control.

For S.M.A.C.C., the conclusion is clear:

GREATER TECHNOLOGICAL POWER MUST COME WITH GREATER RESPONSIBILITY.

Independent creators should not be expected to surrender control of their work simply because they depend on digital platforms to reach an audience.

Nor should audiences be expected to accept misleading advertising, unclear privacy practices or a lack of accountability when things go wrong.

The future of the creator economy will depend not only on the technology we develop, but also on the rules and responsibilities we establish around it.

Big Tech has enormous power. The question is whether that power will be exercised fairly — and who will hold it accountable when it isn’t.

SOURCES AND FURTHER READING

The following links provide starting points for the reporting and legal developments discussed in this edition.

Meta privacy and accountability

Meta’s commercial terms and website access

Copyright and AI

Filmmaking, journalism and digital media

ABOUT S.M.A.C.C.

S.M.A.C.C. — Social Media and Content Creators Community

S.M.A.C.C. examines the technological, commercial, legal and ethical developments affecting people who create, publish and build businesses through digital media.

Our coverage focuses on creator rights, copyright, freedom of expression, privacy, platform accountability, artificial intelligence, filmmaking, journalism and the responsible use of emerging technologies.

We believe independent creators deserve a meaningful voice in the decisions shaping the digital economy.

Visit S.M.A.C.C.: https://www.smac.pro

EDITORIAL DISCLAIMER

This article contains independent news reporting, analysis and commentary. Allegations in legal proceedings are distinguished from judicial findings. Judgments subject to appeal are identified accordingly. The information is provided for general discussion and does not constitute legal or financial advice. Readers should consult original sources and qualified professionals where appropriate.

RELEVANT MENTIONS

@Meta @YouTube @Anthropic @BBC

HASHTAGS

#SMACC #CreatorEconomy #ContentCreators #Meta #ArtificialIntelligence #Copyright #CreatorRights #DigitalMedia #SocialMediaNews #PrivacyRights #PlatformAccountability #IndependentCreators #Filmmaking #Journalism #ResponsibleTechnology

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