Trump administration backs OpenAI in New York Times copyright case

In short: The Trump administration filed a court document supporting OpenAI in The New York Times’ copyright lawsuit, arguing AI training can be “fair use.”

What happened

The Trump administration has stepped into a major copyright lawsuit between The New York Times and OpenAI. The Times sued in December 2023, saying OpenAI trained its AI systems on Times articles without permission. The lawsuit also names Microsoft, and it seeks “billions of dollars” in damages.

This week, the administration filed a “statement of interest” in the case. That is a way for the government to tell a judge how it thinks the law should be interpreted, even though the government is not one of the main parties in the lawsuit.

In its filing, US attorneys supported OpenAI’s position that training a large language model, which is an AI system that learns patterns from lots of text (like studying many books to learn how writing works), can fit under “fair use.” Fair use is a part of US copyright law that sometimes allows limited use of copyrighted material without permission, depending on the details.

The filing argues that blocking this kind of training would slow research and broader economic progress. The administration has previously said, including in a National AI policy framework, that AI training should generally count as fair use.

Why it matters

This case could shape what happens next for news, books, and other creative work online. If the court agrees with OpenAI, AI companies may be able to keep training on copyrighted writing without paying for licenses in many situations. If the court sides with The Times, AI companies could face higher costs, and more publishers may push for payments or stricter limits.

Source: The Verge AI