Wikimedia Foundation Weighs In On NYT v. OpenAI Lawsuit
The organization behind Wikipedia has officially entered the high-stakes legal battle between major media publishers and artificial intelligence developers.
Radwan AbdulhadiEditor and technology writer
The Wikimedia Foundation Enters the Legal Fray
The Wikimedia Foundation has officially weighed in on the high-profile copyright lawsuit launched by The New York Times against OpenAI and Microsoft. The people behind Wikipedia have filed an amicus brief urging careful nuance in the case, which aims to decide whether or not the tech giants' use of content published by The New York Times for AI model training constitutes a violation of copyright law.
The New York Times argues that companies such as OpenAI should not be granted free rein over any of their published content. Conversely, OpenAI and Microsoft maintain that training and deploying artificial intelligence models based on published data is essential for technological development and should consequently fall under the definition of fair use.
Seeking a Third Way Between Extremes
Rather than supporting either extreme outcome, the Wikimedia Foundation is actively seeking a third way. The submitted amicus brief agrees with Microsoft and OpenAI that a restrictive version of fair use could inhibit technological innovation. However, the organization also cautions that a ruling favoring blanket fair use could create a closed web where knowledge is severely weakened due to a lack of available secondary source materials.
The platform's alternative position applies fair use specifically to two particular use cases for AI companies. This framework includes certain model training scenarios as well as a technique known as retrieval-augmented generation. Nevertheless, the organization explicitly does not support retrieval-augmented generation if a large language model is merely regurgitating pre-existing articles without proper attribution.
Model Training and Fair Use Arguments
Regarding the technical specifics of model training, the Wikimedia Foundation contends that scraping copyrighted content should be considered fair use if it is deployed when training large language models that represent something new and different from the original sources. It is worth noting that Wikipedia itself is widely recognized as one of the highest-quality datasets used to train large language models across the industry.
Stephen LaPorte, the Wikimedia Foundation's General Counsel, elaborated on the risks of an unbalanced judicial ruling. "A ruling that does not apply fair use principles carefully could threaten the sustainability of free knowledge, and stifle the development of open source technologies, ultimately impacting access to information for everyone in both cases," LaPorte wrote.
Furthermore, LaPorte emphasized the fundamental nature of the platform's creation process. "The court needs to understand that Wikipedia is created through a collaborative process that requires a strong foundation of open and accessible human knowledge to thrive," he added.
Broader Legal Context and Outlook
A summary judgment in the closely watched lawsuit is expected to arrive in the near future. This particular litigation represents just one of over a dozen similar copyright cases currently working their way through the court system, but legal experts note that it could establish a crucial judicial precedent for the generative artificial intelligence industry.
Sources
- EngadgetThe Wikimedia Foundation weighs in on the NYT's case against OpenAI
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