Canadian Media Titans Take on OpenAI in Copyright Showdown

Five major Canadian news media companies have launched legal action against OpenAI, the firm responsible for the artificial-intelligence program, ChatGPT.

These leading news outlets - Torstar, Postmedia, The Globe and Mail, The Canadian Press, and CBC/Radio-Canada have accused OpenAI of regularly infringing copyright laws and online terms of usage. They assert that OpenAI, without obtaining consent or offering compensation, has been appropriating significant amounts of their content for product development.

The media houses argue that this exploitation of their intellectual property for commercial objectives is not only illegal but also in direct contravention of journalism's public interest ethos.

Despite a New York judge's recent dismissal of a similar case against OpenAI, the Canadian companies are undeterred, demanding both damages and a permanent injunction to stop OpenAI from using their content without permission.

These companies insist that they've never received any form of consideration for OpenAI's usage of their works including financial compensation.

In response, OpenAI said its models were trained on publicly available data, grounded in fair use and related international copyright principles that were fair for creators.

This ongoing case draws further attention to the complex and evolving intersection of AI, copyright, and the media landscape.

- CyberBeat