LONDON: ChatGPT maker OpenAI is in discussions with media firms CNN, Fox Corp. and Time to license their work, Bloomberg News reported on Wednesday, citing people familiar with the matter.
The artificial intelligence startup is looking to license articles from Warner Bros. Discovery Inc’s CNN to train ChatGPT and also feature CNN’s content in its products, the report said.
This comes as OpenAI and its financial backer Microsoft are facing multiple lawsuits accusing them of using copyrighted works to train artificial-intelligence (AI) products.
The latest case has been filed in the Manhattan federal court by a pair of nonfiction authors, Nicholas Basbanes and Nicholas Gage, who say the companies misused their work to train the AI models.
The New York Times, late last month, sued the companies accusing them of using millions of the newspaper’s articles without permission to help train chatbots to provide information to readers.
OpenAI did not immediately respond to a Reuters or Arab News request for comment.
OpenAI in content licensing talks with CNN, Fox and Time
https://arab.news/gd8ad
OpenAI in content licensing talks with CNN, Fox and Time
- Licenced articles, other media content will be used to train AI, to be featured in OpenAI products
- Speculations follow landmark deal with German news publishers Axel Springer in December
Pioneering Asharq Al-Awsat journalist Mohammed al-Shafei dies at 74
- Egyptian was known for his fearless coverage of terrorist, extremist groups
- One of handful of reporters to interview Taliban leader Mullah Omar in 1970s
LONDON: Mohammed al-Shafei, one of Asharq Al-Awsat’s most prominent journalists, has died at the age of 74 after a 40-year career tackling some of the region’s thorniest issues.
Born in Egypt in 1951, al-Shafei earned a bachelor’s degree from Cairo University in 1974 before moving to the UK, where he studied journalism and translation at the University of Westminster and the School of Oriental and African Studies.
He began his journalism career at London-based Arabic papers Al-Muslimoon and Al-Arab — both of which are published by Saudi Research & Publishing Co. which also owns Arab News — before joining Al-Zahira after Iraq’s 1990 invasion of Kuwait.
Al-Shafei joined Asharq Al-Awsat in 1991 and spent 15 years on the sports desk before shifting to reporting on terrorism. He went on to pioneer Arab press coverage in the field, writing about all aspects of it, including its ideologies and ties to states like Iran.
His colleagues knew him for his calm demeanor, humility and meticulous approach, marked by precise documentation, deep analysis and avoidance of sensationalism.
Al-Shafei ventured fearlessly into terrorist strongholds, meeting senior terrorist leaders and commanders. In the 1970s he was one of only a handful of journalists to interview Mullah Omar, the leader of the Taliban, and conducted exclusive interviews with senior figures within Al-Qaeda.
He also tracked post-Al-Qaeda groups like Daesh, Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham and Boko Haram, offering pioneering analysis of Sunni-Shiite extremism and how cultural contexts shaped movements across Asia and Africa.
During the war on Al-Qaeda, he visited US bases in Afghanistan, embedded with international forces, and filed investigative reports from active battlefields — rare feats in Arab journalism at the time.
He interviewed Osama bin Laden’s son, highlighting a humanitarian angle while maintaining objectivity, and was among the few Arab journalists to report from Guantanamo, where his interviews with Al-Qaeda detainees shed light on the group’s operations.
Al-Shafei married a Turkish woman in London in the late 1970s, with whom he had a son and daughter. He was still working just hours before he died in London on Dec. 31.
