Editorial Note: Opinions and thoughts are the author’s own and not those of AFROTECH™. The New York Times inked a multi-year deal with Amazon last month to license its content to Amazon’s artificial intelligence models. Amazon will have access to The New York Times’ content, including NYT Cooking and its sports publication, The Athletic. Amazon’s AI services, such as Alexa, will produce real-time summaries and short excerpts. Similar to other news publishers, The New York Times views a licensing deal as a viable way to generate profits as AI companies attempt to siphon copyrighted content to train their chatbots. Attitudes towards AI use, especially regarding news organizations, can be polarizing. Other publishers such as The Washington Post, Associated Press, and Axios have also signed deals with AI companies to license their content. A few years ago, AI companies were using copyrighted material without permission. Media company Ziff Davis and The New York Times sued OpenAI and...

Peleton, the in-home exercising equipment that hosts virtual classes for users, is now in big legal trouble. National Music Publishers’ Association (NMPA) members are suing the company for using artists’ music without permission. If Peloton loses the case, the company could be out of $150 million. “It is frankly unimaginable that a company of this size and sophistication would think it could exploit music in this way without the proper licenses for this long, and we look forward to getting music creators what they deserve,” NMPA President & CEO David Israelite said in a press release. Rihanna, Wiz Khalifa, Bruno Mars, Drake and dozens of more artists are named in the lawsuit, alleging copyright infringement. “While the fitness technology company has licensed with some of the music publishing industry, it has failed to do so with a significant number of publishers, leaving a great deal of income lost to songwriters,” Israelite said. Peloton gained popularity as it used video workouts...

Spotify today announced it has agreed to settle a $1.6 billion lawsuit filed last December by Wixen Music Publishing, the publisher representing the work of artists like Missy Elliot and Al Green. The lawsuit alleged the music streaming giant was using tens of thousands of songs without securing and paying for the proper license. When the lawsuit was filed, Wixen claimed that of the 30 million songs Spotify had in its vast music library, the company failed to pay songwriter royalties 21 percent of the time. “Spotify failed to properly obtain the equivalent rights for the compositions,” the complaint says. “Spotify has built a billion-dollar business on the backs of songwriters and publishers.” The music publishing company was seeking damages of at least $1.6 billion, asking for $150,000 for each song. “Spotify is a huge part of the future of music, and we look forward to bringing more great music from our clients to the public on terms that compensate songwriters and publishers as...