On May 29, The New York Times announced that it had entered into a licensing agreement with Amazon, to use NYT content “in the tech giant’s artificial intelligence platforms.” This is the first licensing arrangement with a focus on generative A.I. technology, by the Times. Amazon had not commented on the arrangements.
Amazon has been investing in AI technologies for the past year, including with Anthropic, Adept and Covariant.
Not the first
The Times-Amazon agreement not the first between journalistic organizations and platform providers. In April, The Washington Post agreed to license summaries, quotes and links to stories to OpenAI for use by ChatGPT.
The New York Times and The Hollywood Reporter have noted that Axel Springer, Hearst, Conde Nast, Time Condé Nast, News Corp (The Wall Street Journal) and others have also entered into licensing agreements to be compensated for use of their content.
New York Times vs OpenAI and Microsoft
The Times is plaintiff in a high-profile lawsuit against OpenAI and Microsoft, which have allegedly used Times content to train their AI platforms. The Complaint filed by The Times in US Federal Court presented many examples of Times content that were quoted directly by the results of queries against Microsoft’s Copilot and OpenAI’s ChatGPT AI chatbots. That content had not been licensed.
That case has been combined with several California lawsuits of a similar nature by comedian Sarah Silverman, Ta-Nehisi Coates, authors John Grisham, Jonathan Franzen and George RR Martin.
The plaintiffs aim to prove that the defendents engaged in widespread theft, while the defendants said their models were trained on publicly available data under Fair Use doctrine. However, the outputs of AI models do not constitute Fair Use, according to a recent US Court decision.
Similar evolution
The music industry went through a similar evolution a decade ago. Remember Steve Job’s “Rip. Mix. Burn.” campaign when Apple introduced the iPod in 2003, a clarion call to music pirates at the time; a distant memory now supplanted by Apple Music, Spotify and others.
In the video industry, this evolution is still ahead.
Further reading
The Times and Amazon announce an A.I. licensing deal. Article. May 29, 2025. The New York Times
The Washington Post inks deal with OpenAI, news stories to be featured in ChatGPT. Article. April 22, 2025. by Alex Weprin. The Hollywood Reporter.
Partial wins for both sides in New York Times vs OpenAI / Microsoft infringement case. Article. April 7 2025. by Steven Hawley. Piracy Monitor
Why it matters
Amazon and The Times have set an example in the light of day and should be congratulated. It seems to be new trend, turning the tide of copyright infringement by AI platform providers, in which platform executives are increasingly being exposed as condoning in the name of advertising revenue.
Journalism should be compensated, especially in these times of disinformation, and hopefully this is not the only such agreement that we see, going forward.
