OpenAI has scored a victory in its legal fight against publishers over the way its AI tools use the creative work of others. On November 7, a judge dismissed a copyright case against the startupbrought to you by independent editors Alternet and Raw Story.
While several publishers have closed content deals with OpenAI (including Condé Nast, WIRED’s parent company), dozens of copyright lawsuits against AI companies are making their way through the US court system. Many of these lawsuits allege direct copyright infringement, arguing that it is illegal for AI companies to train their tools on newspaper articles, books, paintings, and other copyrighted materials without permission. Some also include other claims ranging from trademark infringement to violation of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), a copyright law intended as an anti-piracy statute that is now widely used by copyright holders. intellectual.
The lawsuit filed by Alternet and Raw Story focused on the DMCA, alleging that OpenAI broke the law by scraping thousands of news articles and stripping them of “copyright management information” (CMI), such as the author’s name, the terms and conditions of use of the work and its title. The media sought damages of no less than $2,500 per infringement, alleging that OpenAI knew that removing CMI from the training data would infringe ChatGPT’s copyright by summarizing or “regurgitating” articles without proper attribution. .
OpenAi’s response to the lawsuit
OpenAI argued that the publishers lacked standing to bring this lawsuit, ensuring that they had not presented evidence that ChatGPT had been trained with their materialmuch less that the training was harmful. Judge Colleen McMahon, of the Southern District of New York, ruled in favor of OpenAI and dismissed the lawsuit for lack of standing.
“We build our AI models using publicly available data, in a manner protected by fair use and related principles, and supported by long-standing and widely accepted legal precedents,” states OpenAI spokesperson Jason Deutrom.
While this is a major setback for Alternet and Raw Story, it’s not necessarily the end: “We intend to continue the case,” says Raw Story founder and CEO John Byrne. The next step is to ask the judge for permission to file an amended complaint.
“We are confident we can respond to the court’s concerns with an amended complaint,” said Matt Topic, a partner at Loevy & Loevy, the law firm representing Raw Story Media. Although Judge McMahon describes herself as “skeptical” that the media could “claim cognizable harm” in the dismissal, her ruling indicates she is open to considering a new filing.
#Judge #dismisses #media #lawsuits #OpenAI #copyright
