Perplexity AI, a startup challenging established players in the AI field, is under legal scrutiny regarding its use of online content, raising questions about copyright and the future of media consumption.
In the competitive landscape of artificial intelligence development, Perplexity AI, a nascent company challenging the likes of OpenAI, has recently found itself embroiled in legal battles regarding the use of online content. The conflict arises from the company’s foundational aspect of providing referenced and sourced responses to user queries, an approach that has nonetheless sparked controversy.
On 7 December 2022, merely a week after OpenAI launched its renowned AI chatbot ChatGPT, Aravind Srinivas unveiled Perplexity. Srinivas, who had previously worked as a research scientist at OpenAI, is the co-founder and CEO of Perplexity AI. During an interview at the TechCrunch Disrupt conference on 30 October, Srinivas highlighted the distinguishing feature of Perplexity, emphasising its commitment to citations and references in delivering information.
Despite these intentions, Perplexity AI has faced legal scrutiny. Last month, News Corp-owned publications, the Wall Street Journal and the New York Post, filed a lawsuit against Perplexity, alleging the plagiarism of content within its AI-generated search results. Such accusations were preceded by a “cease and desist” notification from the New York Times, requesting the discontinuation of its content usage by Perplexity.
Perplexity operates within the niche of AI answer engines, designed to address detailed user inquiries by summarizing diverse internet content rather than merely presenting a list of links. According to Srinivas, the median query on Perplexity is significantly longer, with 10 to 11 words, indicating detailed user questions compared to the typically shorter Google searches.
In defence of the allegations, Srinivas maintains that Perplexity meticulously cites sources and merely curates existing online content into digestible summaries for users, complementing this with source references—akin to journalistic practice. Despite these assertions, Srinivas acknowledged the imperfections in Perplexity’s safety measures, which can potentially be circumvented through prompt engineering—a technique aimed at designing optimal inputs for AI tools to ensure desired outputs.
The legal challenge posed by the media outlets contends that Perplexity directly competes for similar audiences using their copyrighted content. However, Srinivas argues that Perplexity serves a different purpose; it helps users contextualize news and understand its implications—questions such as the potential impact of a news event on stock investments, for instance, cannot typically be addressed by traditional news outlets but can be explored with Perplexity’s format.
Recognising the contribution of news content to the value of its platform, Perplexity AI has taken steps to foster collaboration with publishers by introducing a revenue-sharing scheme. This initiative aims to distribute advertising profits among participating publishers, with Time, Fortune, and Germany’s Der Spiegel reportedly involved.
At the core of the discourse lies Srinivas’s philosophy that facts should not be the property of any single entity; they ought to be accessible universally. He advocates for a world where knowledge and truth aren’t confined by ownership, warning against a hypothetical scenario where facts are monopolised.
Aravind Srinivas, originally hailing from India, holds a Ph.D. in computer science from the University of California, Berkeley. Before his venture with Perplexity, he amassed experience as a research intern at DeepMind and Google, followed by a tenure as a research scientist at OpenAI.
The unfolding legal proceedings and discussions around intellectual property rights underscore the broader conversation about the intersection of AI technology and media content usage—a debate that continues to evolve as technologies advance and legal frameworks attempt to keep pace.
Source: Noah Wire Services
- https://digiday.com/media/perplexity-faces-new-legal-pressure-even-as-it-attempts-to-win-over-publishers-and-advertisers/ – Details the lawsuit filed by News Corp against Perplexity AI, alleging copyright and trademark violations, and the broader legal and economic implications.
- https://www.technologyreview.com/2024/10/31/1106504/ai-search-could-break-the-web/ – Discusses the lawsuit by News Corp and the potential disruption of the digital economy by AI search engines, including the legal and regulatory challenges.
- https://www.lawinc.com/news-corp-perplexity-ai-copyright-lawsuit – Provides an in-depth look at the copyright infringement claims made by News Corp against Perplexity AI, including unauthorized copying and false designation of origin.
- https://www.theinformation.com/articles/legal-threats-google-competition-loom-over-perplexitys-newbie-ceo – Mentions the cease-and-desist letter from The New York Times and the accusations of plagiarism from Forbes and Wired, highlighting the legal threats faced by Perplexity AI.
- https://www.theregister.com/2024/10/22/publishers_sue_perplexity_ai/ – Details the lawsuit filed by News Corp, the allegations of content scraping, and the impact on publishers’ revenue and reputation.
- https://digiday.com/media/perplexity-faces-new-legal-pressure-even-as-it-attempts-to-win-over-publishers-and-advertisers/ – Explains Perplexity’s approach to providing referenced and sourced responses and the legal scrutiny it has faced despite this commitment.
- https://www.technologyreview.com/2024/10/31/1106504/ai-search-could-break-the-web/ – Describes how Perplexity operates within the niche of AI answer engines and the distinction between its queries and traditional search engines like Google.
- https://www.lawinc.com/news-corp-perplexity-ai-copyright-lawsuit – Outlines the legal challenge posed by media outlets that Perplexity competes for similar audiences using copyrighted content and Srinivas’s defense of Perplexity’s purpose.
- https://www.theregister.com/2024/10/22/publishers_sue_perplexity_ai/ – Discusses Perplexity’s initiative to foster collaboration with publishers through a revenue-sharing scheme and the involvement of various publishers.
- https://www.theinformation.com/articles/legal-threats-google-competition-loom-over-perplexitys-newbie-ceo – Provides background on Aravind Srinivas, including his experience at DeepMind, Google, and OpenAI, and his role as the co-founder and CEO of Perplexity AI.
- https://www.technologyreview.com/2024/10/31/1106504/ai-search-could-break-the-web/ – Highlights the broader conversation about the intersection of AI technology and media content usage, and the evolving legal frameworks.
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