In an interview with CNBC's Andrew Ross Sorkin, Microsoft AI CEO Mustafa Suleymanexpressed his understanding of web copyright law. Suleyman says that content that is accessible on the open web is "freeware," and anyone can copy it, reproduce with it, and recreate it.

This stance comes after Microsoft and OpenAI have been accused of stealing copyrighted content to train AI models. The two companies are currently the target of numerous lawsuits, and Suleyman's statement has now started more debates regarding the matter.

Of course, Suleyman did mention scraping from publishers or websites that explicitly saynot to use their content without permission. The Microsoft AI CEO says "that's a gray area," and he thinks that it's "going to work its way through the courts."

A good number of the ongoing lawsuits about this matter suggest that the publishers are not in the same lane as Suleyman. What OpenAIand Microsoft have been accused of doing is rather seen as stealing. But until the laws catch up with current technology, we may not see governments taking a stand against this practice.

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Microsoft AI CEO Mustafa Suleyman: the social contract for content that is on the open web is that it's "freeware" for training AI models pic.twitter.com/FN1xrqnJC0

— Tsarathustra (@tsarnick) June 26, 2024