NYT Sues OpenAI, Microsoft Over Content Used to Train AI Models

The New York Times (Lean Left bias) filed a lawsuit against OpenAI and Microsoft.

For Context: OpenAI is the creator of ChatGPT, the massively popular artificial intelligence chatbot that kicked off the recent economic and cultural fervor surrounding machine learning tools. Microsoft is an investor in OpenAI and has its own AI program named Copilot. These companies train artificial intelligence programs by feeding them massive amounts of content and information gathered by “scraping” the internet. This training process has raised copyright concerns from authors, entertainers, and now news publishers. OpenAI has previously defended the scraping process as protected under the fair use doctrine, which determines copyrighted material may be used as long as it is adequately transformed.

Details: The newspaper’s lawsuit alleged that OpenAI and Microsoft trained their AI programs by “copying and using millions of The Times’s copyrighted news articles, in-depth investigations, opinion pieces, reviews, how-to guides, and more,” accusing the companies of seeking to “free-ride on The Times’s massive investment in its journalism by using it to build substitutive products without permission or payment.”

Key Quotes: A statement from OpenAI published in outlets across the spectrum said the company is “disappointed with this development,” adding that OpenAI respects the “rights of content creators and owners and are committed to working with them to ensure they benefit from AI technology and new revenue models.”

How the Media Covered It: The lawsuit was covered more frequently in left-rated outlets. Outlets noted the various expected legal battles as AI grows.