Definition
Fair use is a U.S. copyright doctrine permitting limited use of copyrighted material without permission for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, and research. Central to ai-copyright litigation over LLM training data.
September 2026 NYT v. OpenAI/Microsoft Context
- Defendants argue AI training transforms copyrighted material and does not substitute for original journalism
- Unsealed filings: Microsoft Brent Hecht said scraping plan made “a complete mockery of ‘fair use’”
- Plaintiffs cite substitution doctrine — AI products “largely substitutive” of publisher journalism
- Trump administration filed brief supporting OpenAI’s unlicensed training fair-use defense
Fair-use outcome in NYT case will set precedent for global AI training practices. Internal "theft" admissions are plaintiff-cited discovery material.