Bruin AI Current Events
OpenAI and Microsoft Clash | Perplexity AI Faces Copyright Battle
Good morning Bruin Bots 🤖
Welcome back!
This week, we explore rising tensions between OpenAI and Microsoft, which could reshape their collaboration.
We'll also dive into the recent Perplexity AI vs. New York Times case, which may set new copyright standards for AI-generated content.
Here’s a run down👇
💸 Economy
🧭 Ethics
-Karen
OpenAI and Microsoft Tensions
OpenAI has been a wildly successful player in the AI space over the past two years, but that has not come without its difficulties. Even this year, the company has had to dampen hopes for growth, expecting a $5 billion loss by the end of 2024. Despite such difficulty, the company has continued amassing investment. Just this month, OpenAI secured a $6.6 billion fundraising deal with Thrive Capital that eventually led the company to being valued at $157 billion.
In tandem with OpenAI’s expanding access to investor capital, their plans to transition to a for-profit structure in coming years is likely to add further capital to the firm’s pockets. Despite such a likelihood of a bright future, longtime partner of OpenAI, Microsoft, has begun to see tensions arise between the two firms. Fears and complaints among the two parties are escalating and straining the relationship.
Microsoft has provided billions in funding and cloud computing for OpenAI, in return they have been given the ability to integrate OpenAI services into its own products. OpenAI has levied complaints regarding Microsoft’s lack of computing power and insufficient support for the company’s needs.
Microsoft has stoked tensions itself as it has responded to OpenAI’s requests for more capital with investment in other AI companies in order to hedge its bets. As a more justifiable reason for this, however, Microsoft has indicated a desire to become more independent from OpenAI, which it currently feels dependent on. Despite bearing fruit in the past, the terms of its prior agreements may not be enough going forward.
Although a renegotiation is the likeliest option, OpenAI could face still face a decline as it may require finding an alternative source of funding or computing power which could delay the development of new AI products. Particularly given the ample competition from other AI startups such as Anthropic, falling behind the curve in OpenAI’s product development is likely to lead other firms to catch up, and possibly even surpass OpenAI’s growth.
-Tobin
The New York Times and Perplexity AI
Perplexity AI is a search engine that began in 2022 which is now backed by Jeff Bezos. The company’s AI engine uses AI to generate search result summaries and aims to help people do research more accurately and effectively.
As one would expect with such an AI, publishers are likely to have the fear that the AI tool may slow down the flow of traffic on a publisher’s website, thus cutting into their profit margins because people no longer view ads through a website such as the New York Times while reading articles. In line with this fear, the New York Times filed a lawsuit against OpenAI late last year because of perceived copyright infringement that is currently being litigated.
As it would turn out, the New York Times has chosen to come for another fight in the AI world: Perplexity AI. The New York Times believes that the way “Perplexity was using its content” possibly “violates copyright law.” The Cease and Desist letter sent by the New York Times has a response deadline by October 30th, when Perplexity has stated it intends to respond to the letter.
Perplexity has defended itself from this accusation from the New York Times, stating that “[it] [is]n’t scraping data for building foundation models, but rather indexing web pages and surfacing factual content as citations to inform responses when a user asks a question,” therefore meaning that it is not a crime. Perplexity’s CEO has stated that he holds interest to collaborate with publishers as well, but its a piece of sentiment all too easy to say when no news company attempts to hold you in account.
The outcome of this case is particularly important as it may set legal precedent for how copyright law applies to AI generated content in the future. Any such expansion of legal precedent ought to be critically observed and understood by both those within the courts but also people like us. The legal precedent would also allow for the expansion of scrutiny and regulation on the AI industry as it regards copyrighted material which could hamper growth int he AI industry.
Although it is clear and obvious that journalists deserve strong and fair wages, it is particularly difficult to understand the push from the New York Times without such a clear intent being expressed at a prior date.
-Tobin
Feel free to elaborate on any of your thoughts through this Anonymous Feedback Form.
All the best,
Tobin Wilson, Editorial Intern
Karen Harrison, Newsletter Manager
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"Success is a work in progress. It’s not about achieving a goal; it’s about constantly improving and pushing boundaries." — Jensen Huang
Interesting read about ethics on the case.
Open AI and topic about Microsoft is interesting as well. Would love to see what happens over time with these two topics.