Oral arguments began in federal court on Wednesday in a case between a coalition of news organizations led by The New York Times and OpenAI, the creator of the artificial intelligence tool ChatGPT, which alleges copyright infringement by OpenAI’s use of copyrighted material for machine learning.

The case centers on allegations that OpenAI unlawfully utilized copyrighted content from various publishers, including The New York Times, to train its generative AI models and the hearing could determine whether OpenAI will face trial.

The plaintiffs claim that ChatGPT’s ability to generate human-like responses stems from the unauthorized use of their work without permission or compensation to develop their large language models (LLMs). OpenAI and its financial backer Microsoft argue that its use of data is protected under the fair use doctrine, which allows limited use of copyrighted material without permission for purposes such as commentary, criticism or education.

Additionally, OpenAI’s legal team asserts that The New York Times has not demonstrated actual harm resulting from their practices and that its use of the copyrighted material is transformative as it does not replicate the content verbatim. On the other hand, the plaintiffs are arguing copyright infringement because OpenAI removed identifiable information such as author bylines and publication details when using the content. They also contend that the LLMs absorb and reproduce expressions from the training data without genuine understanding.

The New York Times, along with the New York Daily News and the Center for Investigative Reporting consolidated their lawsuits into a single action against OpenAI and Microsoft. This comes after a federal judge in New York dismissed a lawsuit brought by Raw Story Media and Alternet Media in November 2024.

The federal judge presiding over the hearing is expected to rule on whether the case will proceed to trial in the coming weeks.