Financial Times Partners with OpenAI to Integrate Journalism into Chatbot

Sunday - May 5 2024, 00:16 UTC - 1 year ago

The Financial Times has partnered with OpenAI to integrate its journalism into the AI chatbot, ChatGPT. This deal will allow select attributed summaries, quotes and links from FT's reporting to appear in ChatGPT's responses. Other media companies have also entered into similar partnerships with OpenAI, but the New York Times has filed a lawsuit against them for alleged copyright violations. This partnership highlights the growing use of AI technology in journalism and the need for responsible and ethical practices.

The Financial Times (FT) is well known for its high-quality journalism and trusted reporting on business and economic news. In a move to expand its reach, it has entered into a partnership deal with OpenAI, the creator of ChatGPT – a chatbot powered by artificial intelligence (AI) that specializes in natural language processing. This deal will see the integration of FT's journalism into the chatbot's responses, allowing users to access relevant information and insights on a variety of topics.

FT Group CEO John Ridding described this partnership as an important agreement that recognizes the value of their award-winning journalism. He believes that it will also provide the news outlet with early insights into how content is surfaced through AI, further strengthening their position as a leading source of knowledge and information for their readers.

This collaboration follows a series of recent content licensing agreements involving OpenAI and other media companies. The Associated Press, Germany's Axel Springer, French daily Le Monde, and Spanish conglomerate Prisa Media have all entered into similar deals to enrich ChatGPT's knowledge base with reliable and trustworthy sources.

However, this partnership has not come without controversy. In December of 2023, the New York Times broke off talks for a similar content sharing deal and proceeded to file a lawsuit against OpenAI in a US federal court. The news giant accused OpenAI of using portions of its exclusive reporting and articles without permission when training the language models behind ChatGPT.

OpenAI has strongly rejected these accusations, arguing that the use of publicly available data, including news articles, falls under fair use for general training purposes. This dispute highlights the legal complexities surrounding tech companies building large language models and news publishers who fiercely protect their intellectual property rights.

In summary, the partnership between the Financial Times and OpenAI marks the continued development and innovation in the field of AI and journalism. It also highlights the importance of responsible and ethical use of AI technology, particularly when it comes to the rights and ownership of information.