BLUEWATER MUSIC SERVICES CORPORATION, Plaintiff, v. SPOTIFY USA INC., Defendant. ROBERT GAUDIO, et al., Plaintiffs, v. SPOTIFY USA INC., Defendant. A4V DIGITAL, INC., et al., Plaintiffs, v. SPOTIFY USA INC., Defendant. ROBERTSON, et al., Plaintiffs, v. SPOTIFY USA INC., Defendant Case No. 3:17-cv-01051, Case No. 3:17-cv-01052, Case No. 3:17-cv-01256, Case No. 3:17-cv-01616 United States District Court, M.D. Tennessee, Nashville Division Filed January 31, 2019 Counsel Christina Manna, Joshua D. Wilson, Liz A. Natal, Matthew G. Sipf, Richard S. Busch, Tara N. Stampley, King & Ballow, Nashville, TN, for Plaintiffs. A. Grace Van Dyke James, Breeding Henry Baysan PC, Knoxville, TN, Christopher Jon Sprigman, Michael Steven Carnevale, Sarah A. Sheridan, Thomas McMahon Cramer, Simpson, Thacher & Bartlett LLP, New York, NY, Harrison Frahn, Jeffrey E. Ostrow, Michael H. Joshi, Simpson, Thacher & Bartlett, LLP, Palo Alto, CA, Nicholas R. Valenti, Samuel F. Miller, Miller Legal Partners PLLC, Nashville, TN, for Defendant Frensley, Jeffrey S., United States Magistrate Judge ORDER *1 This matter is before the Court upon Defendant's Motion to Compel Plaintiffs to Further Respond to Defendant's First Set of Interrogatories and Produce Documents Responsive to ESI Search Terms. Docket No. 167. Defendant has also filed a Supporting Memorandum of Law. Docket No. 168. Plaintiffs have filed a Response in Opposition. Docket No. 174. Defendant has filed a Reply. Docket No. 180. For the reasons discussed below, Defendant's Motion is GRANTED IN PART and DENIED IN PART. I. INTRODUCTION In this copyright infringement action, Plaintiffs allege that Defendant Spotify USA Inc. (“Spotify”) is making unauthorized use of musical compositions that belong to Plaintiffs “in blatant disregard of the exclusive rights that are vested in copyright owners.” Docket No. 1, p. 1. Specifically, Plaintiffs claim that Spotify has reproduced and streamed 2,339 copyrighted works without the appropriate license and without paying the applicable royalties. Id. at 2-24. Spotify denies these allegations. This Motion seeks to compel further responses to Spotify's First Set of Interrogatories as well as “documents responsive to ESI search terms.” Docket No. 167. II. LAW AND ANALYSIS A. Discovery Requests and Motions to Compel Discovery in federal court is governed by the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, which provide that a party may request production of documents or other tangible items as long as the information sought is within the scope of discovery. Fed. R. Civ. P. 34(a); see also Fed. R. Civ. P. 26(b)(1). In general, the scope of discovery extends to nonprivileged information that is relevant to any party's claim or defense, regardless of whether the information sought is admissible, that is “proportional to the needs of the case.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 26(b)(1). The Rules were amended, effective December 1, 2015, in part to address the alleged costs and abuses attendant to discovery. Under Rule 26, “[t]here is now a specific duty for the court and the parties to consider discovery in the light of its ‘proportional[ity] to the needs of the case ....’ ” Turner v. Chrysler Grp. LLC, No. 3:14-1747, 2016 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 11133, at *2, (M.D. Tenn. Jan. 27, 2016), quoting Fed. R. Civ. P. 26(b)(1). The following factors are relevant to a consideration of whether the scope of discovery is proportional: (1) the importance of the issues at stake in the action, (2) the amount in controversy, (3) the parties' relative access to relevant information, (4) the parties' resources, (5) the importance of the discovery in resolving the issues, and (6) whether the burden or expense of the proposed discovery outweighs its likely benefit. Fed. R. Civ. P. 26(b)(1) (numbering added). “Nevertheless, the scope of discovery is, of course, within the broad discretion of the trial court.” Carell, 2011 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 57435 at *5, quoting Lewis v. ACB Bus. Servs., Inc., 135 F.3d 389, 402 (6th Cir. 1998) (internal quotation marks omitted). After making a good faith effort to resolve a dispute, a party may move for an order compelling discovery. Fed. R. Civ. P. 37(a)(1). The moving party “must demonstrate that the requests are relevant to the claims or defenses in the pending action.” Carell, 2011 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 57435 at *5, quoting Anderson v. Dillard's, Inc., 251 F.R.D. 307, 309-10 (W.D. Tenn. 2008) (internal quotation marks omitted). “If relevancy is shown, the party resisting discovery bears the burden of demonstrating why the request is unduly burdensome or otherwise not discoverable under the Federal Rules.” Id. (internal quotation marks and citation omitted). B. The Disputed Requests[1] 1. Interrogatory No. 1 *2 INTERROGATORY 1: Identify each Person who contributed any information utilized by You to answer any of the Interrogatories set forth below and state the Interrogatories for which each such individual contributed such information. Spotify contends that Plaintiffs chose to answer only half of this Interrogatory, identifying the people who contributed information to Plaintiffs' responses, but failing to state “the Interrogatories for which each individual contributed such information.” Docket No. 168, p. 10. Spotify argues that “[t]he information requested is minimally burdensome and will help streamline discovery in this case ....” Id. at 12. Spotify further argues that it is not seeking to discover exactly what information each person provided, but rather “an identification of which Interrogatories each individual contributed to.” Docket No. 180, p. 5. Plaintiffs respond that they “have adequately answered Defendant's Interrogatory No. 1 by identifying individuals who contributed information to answer the Interrogatories.” Docket No. 174, p. 10. Regarding the “second clause” of the Interrogatory, Plaintiffs argue that it is not a standard request and “would not lead to the discovery of relevant evidence that Spotify could use to support its claims or defenses.” Id. The Court finds that Spotify has not demonstrated the relevance of the additional information sought by the Interrogatory to any Party's claim or defense. Plaintiffs have properly responded to the Interrogatory by identifying people who contributed information to the responses, and need not break down contributions by individual Interrogatory. The fact that Plaintiffs propounded a similar Interrogatory is irrelevant. In any event, the Court notes that Spotify responded by identifying three people who, together, contributed to two of Spotify's twenty-seven Interrogatory responses. 2. Interrogatories Nos. 4 and 5 INTERROGATORY 4: Provide a complete list of all the sound recordings and the corresponding International Standard Recording Code (“ISRC”) You believe were reproduced and/or distributed on Spotify that embody the Exhibit A Works-In-Suit, and indicate those You relied on at the time You filed the initial Complaint. INTERROGATORY 5: Provide a complete list of all the sound recordings and the corresponding International Standard Recording Code (“ISRC”) You believe were infringed by Spotify that embody the Exhibit A Works-In-Suit, and indicate those You relied on at the time You filed the initial Complaint. For each sound recording identified, explain why You believe it was infringed, and if You believe it was ever licensed, identify the time period for which You believe it was licensed, how it was licensed, and when said license was terminated. Spotify contends that Plaintiffs have not provided a complete list of the International Standard Recording Codes (“ISRCs”) related to the works-in-suit that Plaintiffs believe were reproduced and/or distributed on Spotify. Docket No. 168, p. 3-6. Instead, Spotify argues, Plaintiffs “have identified at least 27,000 ISRCs across the four cases, whereas their complaints identify just 2,529 works-in-suit.” Id. at 4. Spotify objects to Plaintiffs' invocation of Fed. R. Civ. P. 33(d), because “Spotify cannot read Plaintiffs' minds to discern the answers to these Interrogatories from these purported business records. Only Plaintiffs can tell Spotify which sound recordings Plaintiffs believe embody the works in suit and are related to Plaintiffs' allegations of infringement.” Id. at 5-6 (emphasis in original). Spotify asserts that it has conducted a “spot check” of the ISRCs provided by Plaintiffs, and found that “[m]any of the ISRCs provided by Plaintiffs do not correspond with any titles in the Exhibit A Musical Compositions ....” Docket No. 180, p. 3. *3 Plaintiffs respond that they have already provided the ISRCs that are in their possession to Spotify. Docket No. 174, p. 5-6. They also state that “[i]f Plaintiffs are able to identify additional ISRCs after the extraction is completed, Plaintiffs will identify and produce that information. However, that information is not currently in their possession and therefore cannot be compelled.” Id. at 7. Responding to the allegation that they have produced a “document dump,” Plaintiffs assert that their production “consists of the research that Plaintiffs conducted prior to litigation” and that “Plaintiffs produced such documents as allowed under the parties' E-Discovery Protocol.” Id. at 6. The Court finds that Plaintiffs have responded appropriately to Interrogatories Nos. 4 and 5. In essence, they have stated that these 27,000 ISRCs are the ones that they believe “embody the Exhibit A Works-In-Suit” and relate to their claims, as ordered by the Court. See Docket No. 120. The Interrogatories ask for those ISRCs that Plaintiffs “relied on at the time [they] filed the initial Complaint.” Docket No. 167-5, p. 8. Plaintiffs have responded that these are the ISRCs they compiled when they researched their claims prior to filing suit, and if they get more ISRC information, they will produce it. They made their production according to the terms of the Parties' E-Discovery Protocol, and have no other documents available that would better present the information that Spotify seeks. As such, there is nothing further to be compelled. The Court declines to infer that Plaintiffs are concealing information, as Spotify suggests. Of course, Plaintiffs (and Spotify) have a continuing obligation under the Federal Rules to supplement their discovery responses at any time that becomes. 3. Dispute Regarding Certain Search Terms or Search Results Spotify contends that Plaintiffs have improperly objected to certain search terms that the Parties had previously agreed upon. Docket No. 168, p. 6-10. Spotify asserts that Plaintiffs initially stated that they would not run searches of certain terms, but then later claimed that they were “simply objecting to producing certain document hits resulting from those searches that relate to third parties.” Id. at 9. As a result, “Spotify has no confidence that Plaintiffs properly ran searches using the agreed-upon search terms.” Id. Spotify argues that the search terms at issue have the potential to yield highly relevant documents. Id. at 8. Plaintiffs respond that they have “run searches across the identified custodians using all of the search terms contained in both Spotify's and Plaintiffs' proposed lists. However, Plaintiffs object to producing documents with third parties that result from the searches.” Docket No. 174, p. 9 (emphasis added, internal citation and quotation marks omitted). Plaintiffs argue that they have always objected to producing such documents, citing their response to Spotify's RFP No. 9: “Plaintiffs object to this request to the extent the information sought, particularly as it requests information between Plaintiffs and third-parties, is overly broad, unduly burdensome and not relevant to the claims or defenses asserted in this matter and therefore not ‘proportional to the needs of the case’ ....” Id. at 8, citing Docket No. 174-1 (emphasis in original). Plaintiffs assert that they “have fully explained the nature of their objections and what documents Plaintiffs refuse to produce.” Id. at 9, citing Docket No. 167-12. The letter cited, from Plaintiffs' counsel to Spotify's counsel, does not appear to contain any further information about Plaintiffs' objections to producing documents “between Plaintiffs and third-parties” beyond statements that the information sought is overly broad, unduly burdensome, not relevant, and not proportional. See Docket No. 167-12. *4 The Court agrees with Spotify that Plaintiffs have been inconsistent in their statements about the search terms at issue. See Plaintiffs' letter of November 19, 2018 (Docket No. 167-12) (“Plaintiffs will not run the following searches ....”) and Plaintiffs' letter of December 11, 2018 (Docket No. 167-16) (“we have conducted full searches of the agreed upon search terms ....”). Yet, Plaintiffs have now represented to the Court that they have “run searches across the identified custodians using all of the search terms contained in both Spotify's and Plaintiffs' proposed lists.” Given that representation, the issue before the Court is whether Plaintiffs are properly withholding certain documents that resulted from these searches. The Court finds that Spotify has demonstrated that the withheld documents are potentially relevant. See Docket No. 168, p. 7-9; Docket No. 180, p. 4-5. The burden then falls to Plaintiffs as the party resisting discovery to demonstrate “why the request is unduly burdensome or otherwise not discoverable under the Federal Rules.” Carell, 2011 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 57435 at *5 (emphasis added). Plaintiffs, who have addressed the issue by merely repeating the words “overly broad, burdensome, and not relevant” and suggesting that Spotify should obtain the same documents via subpoena to the third parties, have not demonstrated why, and therefore have not met their burden. Therefore, Plaintiffs are ordered to produce responsive documents resulting from the searches run using the Parties' agreed-upon search terms, regardless of whether such documents are “with third parties.” III. CONCLUSION For the reasons discussed above, Defendant's Motion to Compel Plaintiffs to Further Respond to Defendant's First Set of Interrogatories and Produce Documents Responsive to ESI Search Terms (Docket No. 167) is GRANTED IN PART and DENIED IN PART. IT IS SO ORDERED. Footnotes [1] The Requests listed are taken from Defendant's First Set of Interrogatories. Docket No. 167-5.