Authors File Lawsuit Against OpenAI Over Copyright Infringement
A group of prominent novelists, including John Grisham, Jonathan Franzen, and Elin Hilderbrand, have joined forces to file a lawsuit against OpenAI, accusing the company of copyright infringement. OpenAI, known for its ChatGPT chatbot technology, is alleged to have used the authors’ books to train their AI models without compensating or notifying the writers.
The lawsuit, filed along with the Authors Guild, claims that OpenAI’s chatbots can now produce “derivative works” that mimic and summarize the authors’ books. This could potentially harm the market for the authors’ original works. The complaint also alleges that OpenAI has used copyrighted material to train its models.
OpenAI’s ChatGPT has the capability to generate book summaries that include details not available in reviews or other online sources, suggesting that the AI program was trained on the entire contents of the books. The lawsuit, filed in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, is expected to garner attention due to its high-profile plaintiffs, which include best-selling novelists such as David Baldacci, Jodi Picoult, George R.R. Martin, George Saunders, and Michael Connelly.
The lawsuit follows a series of legal actions against OpenAI by writers concerned about the increasing influence of AI in creative industries. Authors, publishers, and retailers have been attempting to address the rise of AI-generated books on platforms like Amazon, including travel guides and books on niche topics like plant and fungi foraging.
Amazon has implemented new guidelines for self-published authors, requiring them to disclose if they have used AI to create their texts. It has also limited the number of titles users can upload each day. Although Amazon currently does not disclose which books are AI-generated to customers, it may do so in the future.
This lawsuit against OpenAI is part of a growing trend, with other authors also suing OpenAI and Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, for copyright infringement. The legal status of AI and how it interacts with copyright law remains uncertain. While some experts argue that using copyrighted material for training AI constitutes fair use, others believe that the authors’ claims of infringement may succeed in court.
The authors involved in the lawsuit hope to establish boundaries around their work and ensure that technology companies obtain proper licenses if they use their books for training AI models.
Sources:
– Authors Guild
– United States District Court for the Southern District of New York
– Edward Klaris, Intellectual Property and Media Law Expert
– Mary Bly, Historical Romance Novelist
