Business
Get paid or sue? How the news business is combating the threat of AI
Journalist Javier Cabral wanted to test Google’s much-hyped, experimental artificial intelligence-powered search results. So he typed out a question about a topic he knew intimately: the Long Beach bakery Gusto Bread’s coffee.
In less than a second, Google’s AI summarized information about the bakery in a few sentences and bullet points. But according to Cabral, the summary wasn’t original — it appeared to be lifted from an article he wrote last year for the local food, community and culture publication L.A. Taco, where he serves as the editor in chief. For a previous story, he’d spent at least five days working on a feature about the bakery, arriving at 4 a.m. to report on the bread making process.
As Cabral saw it, the search giant’s AI was ripping him off.
“The average consumer that just wants to go check it out, they’re probably not going to read [the article] anymore” Cabral said in an interview. “When you break it down like that, it’s a little enraging for sure.”
The rise of AI is just the latest existential threat to news organizations such as Cabral’s, which are fighting to survive amid a rapidly changing media and information environment.
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1. L.A. Taco editor Javier Cabral in the alleyway behind the Figueroa Theatre in Los Angeles in 2020. (Mariah Tauger / Los Angeles Times) 2. The L.A. Taco office in Los Angeles on June 26. (Zoe Cranfill / Los Angeles Times)
News outlets have struggled to attract subscribers and advertising dollars in the internet age. And social media platforms such as Facebook, which publishers depended on to get their content to a massive audience, have largely pivoted away from news. Now, with the growth of AI thanks to companies including Google, Microsoft and ChatGPT maker OpenAI, publishers fear catastrophic consequences will result from digital programs automatically scraping information from their archives and delivering it to audiences for free.
“There’s something that’s very fundamentally unfair about this,” said Danielle Coffey, president and chief executive of the News/Media Alliance, which represents publications including the New York Times and the Los Angeles Times. “What will happen is there won’t be a business model for us in a scenario where they use our own work to compete with us, and that’s something we’re very worried about.”
Tech companies leading the charge on AI say their tools are not engaged in copyright infringement and can drive traffic to publishers.
Google said in a statement that it designed its AI Overviews — the summaries that appear when people enter search queries — to “provide a snapshot of relevant information from multiple web pages.” The companies also provide links with the summaries so people can learn more.
AI and machine learning could provide useful tools for publishers when doing research or creating reader recommendations. But for many journalistic outlets, the AI revolution represents yet another consequence of the tech behemoths becoming the middlemen between the content producers and their consumers, and then taking the spoils for themselves.
“For the past 20 years, big tech has dictated the business model for news by essentially mandating how news is distributed, either through search or social, and this has turned out to be pretty disastrous for most news organizations,” said Gabriel Kahn, a professor at USC’s Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism.
L.A. Taco operates on a tight budget; its publisher doesn’t take a salary. The site makes most of its money through memberships, so if people are getting the information directly from Google instead of paying to read L.A. Taco’s articles, that’s a major problem. Above, a staff meeting at its Chinatown office.
(Zoe Cranfill / Los Angeles Times)
To respond to the problem, news organizations have taken dramatically different approaches. Some, including the Associated Press, the Financial Times and News Corp., the owner of the Wall Street Journal and Dow Jones, have signed licensing deals to allow San Francisco-based OpenAI to use their content in exchange for payment. Vox Media and the Atlantic have also struck deals with the firm.
Others have taken their fights to court.
The New York Times in December sued OpenAI and Microsoft, alleging that both companies used its articles to train their digital assistants and share text of paywalled stories to its users without compensation. The newspaper estimated that those actions resulted in billions of dollars in damages.
Separately, last month Forbes threatened legal action against AI startup Perplexity, accusing it of plagiarism. After receiving Forbes’ letter, Perplexity said it changed the way it presented sources and adjusted the prompting for its AI models.
The company said it has been developing a revenue sharing program with publishers.
The New York Times said in its lawsuit that its battle against AI isn’t just about getting paid for content now; it’s about protecting the future of the journalism profession.
“With less revenue, news organizations will have fewer journalists able to dedicate time and resources to important, in-depth stories, which creates a risk that those stories will go untold,” the newspaper said in its lawsuit. “Less journalism will be produced, and the cost to society will be enormous.”
OpenAI said that the New York Times’ lawsuit was without merit and that it has been unable to reproduce examples the newspaper has cited of ChatGPT regurgitating paywalled articles. The company said publishers have a way to opt out of their sites being used to train AI tools. Microsoft did not respond to a request for comment.
The Associated Press, the Financial Times and News Corp., the owner of the Wall Street Journal and Dow Jones, have signed licensing deals to allow San Francisco-based OpenAI to use their content in exchange for payment.
(Michael Dwyer / Associated Press)
“Microsoft and OpenAI have the process entirely backwards,” Davida Brook, a partner at law firm Susman Godfrey, which is representing the New York Times, said in a statement. “Neither The New York Times nor other creators should have to opt out of having their works stolen.”
The legal war is spreading. In April, eight publications owned by private equity firm Alden Global Capital also accused OpenAI and Microsoft of using and providing information from its news stories without payment.
In some cases, OpenAI’s chat tool provided incorrect information attributed to the publications, Frank Pine, executive editor for MediaNews Group and Tribune Publishing, said in a statement. For example, according to Pine, OpenAI said that the Mercury News recommended injecting disinfectants to treat COVID-19 and the Denver Post published research suggesting that smoking cures asthma. Neither publication has made such claims.
“[W]hen they’re not delivering the actual verbatim reporting of our hard-working journalists, they misattribute bogus information to our news publications, damaging our credibility,” Pine said.
OpenAI said that it was “not previously aware” of Alden’s concerns and that it is “actively engaged in constructive partnerships and conversations with many news organizations around the world to explore opportunities, discuss any concerns, and provide solutions.”
One such partnership is OpenAI’s recent deal with News Corp., which allows the tech company’s tools to display content from news outlets in response to user questions and access content from the Wall Street Journal, New York Post and publications in the United Kingdom and Australia to train its AI models. The deal was valued at more than $250 million over five years, according to the Wall Street Journal, which cited unnamed sources. News Corp and OpenAI declined to comment on the financial terms.
“This landmark accord is not an end, but the beginning of a beautiful friendship in which we are jointly committed to creating and delivering insight and integrity instantaneously,” Robert Thomson, chief executive of News Corp. said in a statement.
“We are committed to a thriving ecosystem of publishers and creators by making it easier for people to find their content through our tools,” OpenAI said in a statement.
Although OpenAI has cut deals with some publishers, the tech industry has argued that it should be able to train its AI models on content available online and bring up relevant information under the “fair use” doctrine, which allows for the limited reproduction of content without permission from the copyright holder.
“As long as these companies aren’t reproducing verbatim what these news sites are putting out, we believe they are well within their legal rights to offer this content to users,” said Chris MacKenzie, spokesman for Chamber of Progress, an industry group that represents companies including Google and Meta. “At the end of the day, it’s important to remember that nobody has a copyright on facts.”
But outlets including the New York Times reject such fair-use claims, arguing that in some cases the chatbots do reproduce their content, unfairly profiting from their thoroughly researched and fact-checked work. The situation is even more difficult for smaller outlets such as L.A. Taco, which can’t afford to sue OpenAI or develop their own AI platforms.
Located in L.A.’s Chinatown with four full-time workers and two part-timers, L.A. Taco operates on a tight budget; its publisher doesn’t take a salary. The site makes most of its money through memberships, so if people are getting the information directly from Google instead of paying to read L.A. Taco’s articles, that’s a major problem.
Legislation is another potential way to deal with big tech’s disruption of the journalism industry. The California News Publishers Assn., of which the Los Angeles Times is a member, is sponsoring a state bill known as the California Journalism Preservation Act, which would require digital advertising giants to pay news outlets for accessing their articles, either through a predetermined fee or through an amount set by arbitration. Most publishers would have to spend 70% of the funds received on journalists’ salaries. Another bill lawmakers are considering would tax large tech platforms for the data they collect from users and pump the money into news organizations by giving them a tax credit for employing full-time journalists.
“The way out of this is some type of regulation,” USC’s Kahn said. “Congress can’t get anything done so that basically gives these platforms free rein to do what they want with very little consequence.”
Times editorial library director Cary Schneider contributed to this report.
Times Insider explains who we are and what we do, and delivers behind-the-scenes insights into how our journalism comes together.
Politicians in Washington and the reporters who cover them have an often adversarial relationship.
But on the last Saturday in April, they gather for an irreverent celebration of press freedom and the First Amendment at the Washington Hilton Hotel: The White House Correspondents’ Association dinner.
Hosted by the association, an organization that helps ensure access for media outlets covering the presidency, the dinner attracts Hollywood stars; politicians from both parties; and representatives of more than 100 networks, newspapers, magazines and wire services.
While The Times will have two reporters in the ballroom covering the event, the company no longer buys seats at the party, said Richard W. Stevenson, the Washington bureau chief. The decision goes back almost two decades; the last dinner The Times attended as an organization was in 2007.
“We made a judgment back then that the event had become too celebrity-focused and was undercutting our need to demonstrate to readers that we always seek to maintain a proper distance from the people we cover, many of whom attend as guests,” he said.
It’s a decision, he added, that “we have stuck by through both Republican and Democratic administrations, although we support the work of the White House Correspondents’ Association.”
Susan Wessling, The Times’s Standards editor, said the policy is a product of the organization’s desire to maintain editorial independence.
“We don’t want to leave readers with any questions about our independence and credibility by seeming to be overly friendly with people whose words and actions we need to report on,” she said.
The celebrity mentalist Oz Pearlman is headlining the evening, in lieu of the usual comedy set by the likes of Stephen Colbert and Hasan Minhaj, but all eyes will be on President Trump, who will make his first appearance at the dinner as president.
Mr. Trump has boycotted the event since 2011, when he was the butt of punchlines delivered by President Barack Obama and the talk show host Seth Meyers mocking his hair, his reality TV show and his preoccupation with the “birther” movement.
Last month, though, Mr. Trump, who has a contentious relationship with the media, announced his intention to attend this year’s dinner, where he will speak to a room full of the same reporters he often derides as “enemies of the people.”
Times reporters will be there to document the highs, the lows and the reactions in the room. A reporter for the Styles desk has also been assigned to cover the robust roster of after-parties around Washington.
Some off-duty reporters from The Times will also be present at this late-night circuit, though everyone remains cognizant of their roles, said Patrick Healy, The Times’s assistant managing editor for Standards and Trust.
“If they’re reporting, there’s a notebook or recorder out as usual,” he said. “If they’re not, they’re pros who know they’re always identifiable as Times journalists.”
For most of The Times’s reporters and editors, though, the evening will be experienced from home.
“The rest of us will be able to follow the coverage,” Mr. Stevenson said, “without having to don our tuxes or gowns.”
A former female staffer who worked for Beast Industries, the media venture behind the popular YouTube channel MrBeast, is suing the company, alleging she was sexually harassed and fired shortly after she returned from maternity leave.
The employee, Lorrayne Mavromatis, a Brazilian-born social media professional, alleges in a lawsuit she was subjected to sexual harassment by the company’s management and demoted after she complained about her treatment. She said she was urged to join a conference call while in labor and expected to work during her maternity leave in violation of the Family and Medical Leave Act, according to the federal complaint filed Wednesday in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of North Carolina.
“This clout-chasing complaint is built on deliberate misrepresentations and categorically false statements, and we have the receipts to prove it. There is extensive evidence — including Slack and WhatsApp messages, company documents, and witness testimony — that unequivocally refutes her claims. We will not submit to opportunistic lawyers looking to manufacture a payday from us,” Gaude Paez, a Beast Industries spokesperson, said in a statement.
Jimmy Donaldson, 27, began MrBeast as a teen gaming channel that soon exploded into a media company worth an estimated $5 billion, with 500 employees and 450 million subscribers who watch its games, stunts and giveaways.
Mavromatis, who was hired in 2022 as its head of Instagram, described a pervasive climate of discrimination and harassment, according to the lawsuit.
In her complaint, she alleges the company’s former CEO James Warren made her meet him at his home for one-on-one meetings while he commented on her looks and dismissed her complaints about a male client’s unwanted advances, telling her “she should be honored that the client was hitting on her.”
When Mavromatis asked Warren why MrBeast, Donaldson, would not work with her, she was told that “she is a beautiful woman and her appearance had a certain sexual effect on Jimmy,” and, “Let’s just say that when you’re around and he goes to the restroom, he’s not actually using the restroom.”
Paez refuted the claim.
“That’s ridiculous. This is an allegation fabricated for the sole purpose of sparking headlines,” Paez said.
Mavromatis said she endured a slate of other indignities such as being told by Donaldson that she “would only participate in her video shoot if she brought him a beer.”
“In this male-centric workplace, Plaintiff, one of the few women in a high-level role, was excluded from otherwise all-male meetings, demeaned in front of colleagues, harassed, and suffered from males be given preferential treatment in employment decisions,” states the complaint.
When Mavromatis raised a question during a staff meeting with her team, she said a male colleague told her to “shut up” or “stop talking.”
At MrBeast headquarters in Greenville, N.C., she said male executives mocked female contestants participating in BeastGames, “who complained they did not have access to feminine hygiene products and clean underwear while participating in the show.”
In November 2023, Mavromatis formally complained about “the sexually inappropriate encounters and harassment, and demeaning and hostile work environment she and other female employees had been living and experiencing working at MrBeast,” to the company’s then head of human resources, Sue Parisher, who is also Donaldson’s mother, according to the suit.
In her complaint, Mavromatis said Beast Industries did not have a method or process for employees to report such issues either anonymously or to a third party, rather employees were expected to follow the company’s handbook, “How to Succeed In MrBeast Production.”
In it, employees were instructed that, “It’s okay for the boys to be childish,” “if talent wants to draw a dick on the white board in the video or do something stupid, let them” and “No does not mean no,” according to the complaint.
Mavromatis alleges that she was demoted and then fired.
Paez said that Mavromatis’s role was eliminated as part of a reorganization of an underperforming group within Beast Industries and that she was made aware of this.
Lululemon, the yoga pants and athletic clothing company, has hired a former executive from a rival, Nike, as its new chief executive.
Heidi O’Neill, who spent more than 25 years at Nike, will take the reins and join Lululemon’s board of directors on Sept. 8, the company announced on Wednesday.
The leadership change is happening during a tumultuous time for Lululemon, which had grown to $11 billion in revenue by persuading shoppers to ditch their jeans and slacks for stretchy leggings. But lately, sales have declined in North America amid intense competition and shifting fashion trends, with consumers favoring looser styles rather than the form-fitting silhouettes for which Lululemon is best known.
“As I step into the C.E.O. role in September, my job will be to build on that foundation — to accelerate product breakthroughs, deepen the brand’s cultural relevance, and unlock growth in markets around the world,” Ms. O’Neill, 61, said in a statement.
Lululemon, based in Vancouver, British Columbia, has also been entangled in a corporate power struggle over the company’s future. Its billionaire founder, Chip Wilson, has feuded with the board, nominated independent directors and criticized executives.
Lululemon’s previous chief executive, Calvin McDonald, stepped down at the end of January as pressure mounted from Mr. Wilson and some investors. One activist investor, Elliott Investment Management, had pushed its own chief executive candidate, who was not selected.
The interim co-chiefs, Meghan Frank and André Maestrini, will lead the company until Ms. O’Neill’s arrival, when they are expected to return to other senior roles. The pair had outlined a plan to revive sales at Lululemon, promising to invest in stores, save more money and speed up product development.
“We start the year with a real plan, with real strategies,” Mr. Maestrini said in an interview this year. “We make sure decisions are made fast.”
Lululemon said last month that it would add Chip Bergh, the former chief executive of Levi Strauss, to its board to replace David Mussafer, the chairman of the private equity firm Advent International, whom Mr. Wilson had sought to remove.
Ms. O’Neill climbed the organizational chart at Nike for decades, working across divisions including consumer sports, product innovation and brand marketing, and was most recently its president of consumer, product and brand. She left Nike last year amid a shake-up of senior management that led to the elimination of her role.
Analysts said Ms. O’Neill would be expected to find ways to energize Lululemon’s business and reset the company’s culture in order to improve performance.
“O’Neill is her own person who will come with an agenda of change,” said Neil Saunders, the managing director of GlobalData, a data analytics and consulting company. “The task ahead is a significant one, but it can be undertaken from a position of relative stability.”
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