OpenAI, which is currently seeking new financing at a $100 billion valuation, has previously sought licensing deals with publishers and signed agreements with the Associated Press and German media company Axel Springer SE. Microsoft, OpenAI's largest backer, has seen its share price rise 58% over the past year. The Times has stated that if Microsoft and OpenAI wish to use its work for commercial purposes, they must first obtain permission, which they have not done.
Key takeaways:
- The New York Times Co. has filed a lawsuit against Microsoft Corp. and OpenAI Inc. for allegedly using its copyrighted content to develop artificial intelligence services.
- The technology firms are accused of using millions of copyrighted articles to train AI features like chatbots, causing billions of dollars in damages.
- This is the first lawsuit by a major media organization challenging OpenAI's practice of scraping text widely from the web to train its chatbot.
- The New York Times alleges that Microsoft copied its articles verbatim for its Bing search engine and used OpenAI’s tech to boost its value by a trillion dollars.