The American start-up OpenAI, and Microsoft, its main investor, are the target of a new complaint in the United States for copyright infringement. “This lawsuit stems from the fact that (the companies) stole millions of authors' copyrighted articles, without permission or payment, in order to market their generative artificial intelligence products, including ChatGPT and Copilot.”is written in the complaint filed Tuesday April 30 with a New York court.
Eight titles from the second largest newspaper group in the United States
The complaint was filed by eight local American press titles: Chicago Tribune, New York Daily News, Denver Post, Orlando Sentinel, Sun Sentinel of Florida, San Jose Mercury News, Orange County Register And St. Paul Pioneer Press. All these titles belong to the same group, Alden Global Capital, a New York hedge fund having created the second largest press group in the country behind Gannett (USA Today). Alden Global Capital is nicknamed “the grim reaper of newspapers”due to massive cuts in staffing and spending.
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“We have spent billions of dollars collecting information and reporting news in our publications, Frank Pine, editor-in-chief of MediaNews Group and Tribune Publishing, owned by Alden Global Capital, said in a statement. We cannot allow OpenAI and Microsoft to expand Big Tech’s strategy of stealing our work to create their own companies.” The plaintiff newspapers accuse the two companies of offering extracts from articles through their chatbots, and of providing, in certain cases, inaccurate or misleading information.
OpenAI multiplies complaints… and partnerships with other media
OpenAI and Microsoft are accumulating media complaints for copyright infringement. At the end of last year, the New York Times had sued the two companies, accusing them of using “its journalistic content to create substitute products without authorization or remuneration”. The media The Intercept, Raw Story and AlterNet followed suit in early March, criticizing OpenAI and Microsoft for removing various copyright information to train their generative AI models.
On the other hand, the Californian start-up is increasing its content licensing agreements with certain media. Agreements that allow it to train its AI models with reliable data, and give the media concerned increased visibility, with article summaries and links directly accessible from ChatGPT. After four agreements concluded with the American agency Associated Presslast summer, the German media group Axel Springer in December, The world and the Spanish group Prisa in March, Financial Times also announced a partnership this Monday.
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