Microsoft and OpenAI are no strangers in the corridors of justice, particularly when it comes to copyright infringement disputes. It is well established that advanced AI models such as Microsoft Copilot and ChatGPT rely heavily on vast amounts of online content, including material from outlets like Windows Central, for training purposes.
In court proceedings, Microsoft and OpenAI have consistently argued that copyright law does not explicitly prohibit the use of online content to train AI models. However, with Google racing ahead by embedding AI directly into search, the industry finds itself at a tipping point. As traditional outlets struggle to compete, many are shutting down, leaving thousands of experienced journalists in the lurch.
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has openly acknowledged that building tools like ChatGPT would be virtually impossible without relying on copyrighted material. That admission now looms large as a coalition of publishers, representing nearly 400 newspapers, has filed a lawsuit against Microsoft and OpenAI in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, accusing them of copyright infringement (via Bloomberg).
The complaint indicates that the two companies are unlawfully using their content to develop and train the AI chatbots without consent or compensation. According to the complaint:
"Defendants systematically and secretly crawled the Publishers’ websites—including content behind paywalls and other access restrictions—and copied the Publishers’ articles, stories, and other original works onto their own servers without authorization."
The publishers argue that the companies have generated billions from stealing their work and have not paid a dime for it. They are now seeking statutory damages and injunctive relief, citing copyright infringement and violations of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.
Speaking to Bloomberg, OpenAI spokesperson Drew Pusateri indicated:
“Our models empower innovation, are trained on publicly available data, and are grounded in fair use."
“It would be inequitable if at the end of this you have a resolution that only benefits the largest players in the marketplace and not the people who are doing hard work reporting on things that frankly very few outlets still cover in America today,” former New Jersey Attorney General Matthew Platkin added.
The publishers argue that the AI revolution could be a "death knell for local journalism" if these AI firms aren't held accountable and continue to steal content without compensation.
Elsewhere, a separate 2024 report suggests that AI companies, including Anthropic, Google, and OpenAI, had hit a wall due to a lack of high-quality content for training, which prevented them from developing advanced AI models.
This opens up a broader discussion about the future of AI models if Google is hell-bent on integrating AI into search, after it has practically run every publication into the ground.
The dead internet theory, in particular, comes to mind. It suggests that prolonged exposure of large language models to low-quality training data negatively impacts accuracy, comprehension, and thought process. What's worse is that the phenomenon could only be less than 3 years away if recent studies are anything to go by.
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