This office is conducting a continuing investigation into recurring harms associated with involuntary album placement, excessive earnestness, anthem inflation, and the persistent conversion of manageable musical ideas into events of public consequence.
For decades, the opposing party has engaged in repeated and conspicuous acts of forced significance, including but not limited to the theatrical inflation of ordinary sentiments into stadium-grade declarations.
On September 9, 2014, concurrent with the public introduction of the iPhone 6, Apple Inc. caused U2’s album Songs of Innocence to be automatically added to the purchased libraries of iTunes users without prior consent. The album appeared on personal devices and within private digital libraries irrespective of user intent. On September 15, 2014, Apple issued a removal tool stating that users could elect to have the album removed. The existence of a removal mechanism confirms the initial non-consensual placement. Such conduct raises concerns sounding in unauthorized access and interference with personal digital property, including but not limited to principles reflected in 18 U.S.C. § 1030, trespass to chattels, and expectations of privacy in personal digital effects consistent with the Fourth Amendment.
Minor melodic ideas are routinely elevated into sweeping declarations of moral and historical consequence without adequate factual basis.
Delay, reverb, and ambient repetition appear to have been deployed not as tasteful tools, but as a means of manufacturing the illusion of depth.
Upon information and belief, Bono has, over an extended period, appeared in public while wearing tinted eyewear of unclear necessity, including but not limited to circumstances in which no reasonable observer would conclude that glare mitigation was required. Said eyewear has been deployed in indoor, outdoor, daytime, nighttime, and otherwise non-ocularly hazardous conditions. The continued use of such eyewear raises legitimate questions as to intent, purpose, and whether concealment of expression has become a substitute for substance.
Aaron R. Gerger is a New York-based attorney whose practice concerns cultural disputes, digital intrusion, and other matters in which the public has been asked to tolerate more than it reasonably should. He approaches each matter with seriousness, restraint, and a working assumption that overreach is best addressed promptly.
Relevant experience includes sustained review of the 2014 Apple/U2 distribution incident, continuing analysis of Bono-adjacent excess, and a longstanding commitment to the position that not every chorus warrants historical significance.
Members of the public who believe they have suffered measurable harm from prolonged exposure to U2 may submit the following intake materials for preliminary confidential review.