Media outlets are calling foul play over AI companies using their content to build chatbots. They may find friends in the Senate.
HOLLYWOOD REPORTER
More than a decade ago, the normalization of tech companies carrying content created by news organizations without directly paying them — cannibalizing readership and ad revenue — precipitated the decline of the media industry. With the rise of generative artificial intelligence, those same firms threaten to further tilt the balance of power between Big Tech and news.
On Wednesday, lawmakers in the Senate Judiciary Committee referenced their failure to adopt legislation that would’ve barred the exploitation of content by Big Tech in backing proposals that would require AI companies to strike licensing deals with news organizations.
Richard Blumenthal, Democrat of Connecticut and chair of the committee, joined several other senators in supporting calls for a licensing regime and to establish a framework clarifying that intellectual property laws don’t protect AI companies using copyrighted material to build their chatbots.
“We need to learn from the mistakes of our failure to oversee social media and adopt standards,” he said.
The fight over the legality of AI firms eating content from news organizations without consent or compensation is split into two camps: Those who believe the practice is protected under the “fair use” doctrine in intellectual property law that allows creators to build upon copyrighted works, and those who argue that it constitutes copyright infringement. Courts are currently wrestling with the issue, but an answer to the question is likely years away. In the meantime, AI companies continue to use copyrighted content as training materials, endangering the financial viability of media in a landscape in which readers can bypass direct sources in favor of search results generated by AI tools.
During the hearing centered on oversight of AI in journalism, Roger Lynch, chief executive of Condé Nast, urged Congress to “clarify that the use of our content and other publications’ content for training and output of AI models is not fair use.” With that issue out of the way, he explained that the “free market will take care of the rest” in reference to how licensing deals could be struck.
Josh Hawley, Republican of Missouri, called the proposal “imminently sensible.” Going one step further, he stressed, “Why shouldn’t we expand the regime outward to say anyone whose data is ingested and regurgitated by generative AI — whether in name, image or likeness — has the right to compensation?”
A lawsuit from The New York Times, filed last month, pulled back the curtain behind negotiations over the price and terms of licensing its content. Before suing, it said that it had been talking for months with OpenAI and Microsoft about a deal, though the talks reached no such truce. In the backdrop of AI companies crawling the internet for high-quality written content, news organizations have been backed into a corner, having to decide whether to accept lowball offers to license their content or expend the time and money to sue in a lawsuit. Some companies, like Axel Springer, took the money.
