Two Suno copyright lawsuits ended this month, and neither Jamendo nor The American Dollar said why

Two copyright lawsuits against Suno ended in August 2026, months after they were filed and without a word of explanation from either plaintiff. Digital Music News reported on August 14 that Queens electronic duo The American Dollar and Winamp’s licensing arm Jamendo both moved to voluntarily dismiss their separate complaints.

The two exits are not equivalent. The American Dollar, litigating as Poseidon Wave Media in case 1:26-cv-03921, dismissed with prejudice. Jamendo dismissed without prejudice. One door is bolted, the other is left open.

Why dismissing with prejudice is the detail worth reading

A voluntary dismissal with prejudice bars the plaintiff from bringing the same claims again. Nobody gives that up for free. It is the standard condition a defendant asks for when it pays to make a case go away, so the filing tells you something the notice does not say out loud.

Jamendo’s choice points the other way. Without prejudice keeps the claims alive, which reads either as a pause or as a card held back. Jamendo had built the stronger paper trail: it invoiced Suno in September 2025 for roughly 919 hours of audio it says ended up inside Bark, Suno’s early open-source model, and Suno confirmed receipt without paying.

Neither notice explains anything, and neither company has issued a statement. Silence of this kind usually means terms exist and a confidentiality clause covers them.

Why small rightsholders keep folding while major labels sign

The pattern is now familiar. Suno settled with Warner Music and turned that case into a licensing deal, then signed BMG this month. Meanwhile a Queens duo and a Belgian licensing company took their claims and left quietly, weeks apart.

Scale sets the outcome. A major label can fund years of discovery and walk away with equity and a rate card. An independent rightsholder funds a complaint out of operating cash and takes the first offer that covers costs. Jamendo’s parallel case against Nvidia over the same dataset continues, so the company has not abandoned the argument, only this defendant.

Individual artists have found the courts no easier. The Woulard class action against Udio survived a dismissal bid but got moved to New York, and the one ruling to decide anything on the merits came from GEMA, a collecting society with 100,000 members behind it.