Joseph Saveri Law Firm, LLP and Matthew Butterick File Class Action Against OpenAI, Inc. for Copyright Infringement, DMCA Violations, Negligence, Unlawful Competition, and Unjust Enrichment

SAN FRANCISCO, June 29, 2023 /PRNewswire/ -- OpenAI, Inc., OpenAI, L.P., and OpenAI OpCo, L.L.C. (collectively OpenAI) have created products that infringe the rights of book authors under the guise of alleged "artificial intelligence." The Joseph Saveri Law Firm, LLP—a leading class action firm with offices in California and New York—has filed a lawsuit in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California on behalf of a class of plaintiffs seeking compensation for damages caused by OpenAI and an injunction to prevent future harms. The lawsuit alleges direct and vicarious copyright infringement related to forgeries, violations of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, negligence, unjust enrichment, and various violations of California's unfair competition laws.

As alleged in the complaint, ChatGPT is a software product created, maintained, and sold by OpenAI. ChatGPT is powered by two AI software programs called GPT-3.5 and GPT-4, also known as large language models. Rather than being programmed in the traditional way, a large language model is "trained" by copying massive amounts of text and extracting expressive information from it. This body of text is called "the training dataset." Once a large language model has copied and ingested the text in its training dataset, it is able to emit convincingly naturalistic text outputs in response to user prompts. A large language model's output is therefore entirely and uniquely reliant on the material in its training dataset. Every time it assembles a text output, the model relies on the information it extracted from its training dataset.

Plaintiffs represent a class of U.S. writers who hold registered copyrights in their publications. They did not consent to the use of their copyrighted books as training material for GPT-3.5 and GPT-4. Nonetheless, their copyrighted materials were ingested and used to train these large language models. Indeed, when ChatGPT is prompted, it generates summaries of plaintiffs' copyrighted works—something only possible if GPT-3.5 and GPT-4 were trained on plaintiffs' copyrighted works. Defendants, by usage of these large language models, benefit commercially and profit richly from the use of plaintiffs' and class members' copyrighted materials. If this alleged behavior is allowed to continue, these models will eventually replace the authors whose stolen works power these AI products with whom they are competing.

In addition to obtaining redress for this alleged wrongful conduct, this lawsuit—Tremblay v. OpenAI, Inc.—seeks to prevent that outcome and ensure these products follow the same rules as any other new technology that involves the use of massive amounts of intellectual property.

"As artificial intelligence continues to drastically alter every aspect of the modern world, it's critical that we recognize and protect the rights of authors such as these against unlawful theft and fraud," said Joseph Saveri, founder of the Joseph Saveri Law Firm, LLP. He continued, "GPT-3.5 and GPT-4 are not just an infringement of authors' rights; whether they aim to or not, models such as this will eliminate "author" as a viable career path. This case represents a larger fight for preserving ownership rights for all artists and other creators."

"AI needs to be fair and ethical for everyone," said lawyer and published author Matthew Butterick. "OpenAI is appropriating the work of thousands of authors without consent, credit, or compensation. It's an honor to stand up on behalf of fellow book authors and con­tinue the vital con­ver­sa­tion about how AI will coex­ist with human cul­ture and cre­ativ­ity."

For more information, please see our case page and our case website llmlitigation.com.

ABOUT THE FIRM

The Joseph Saveri Law Firm, LLP is one of the country's most acclaimed, successful boutique firms, specializing in antitrust, class actions, and complex litigation on behalf of national and international consumers, purchasers, and employees across diverse industries. For further information on our practice and accomplishments on behalf of our clients, please visit www.saverilawfirm.com or call us at (415) 655-5958.

ABOUT MATTHEW BUTTERICK

Matthew Butterick is a lawyer, programmer, designer, and writer. He has been professionally involved with open-source software since 1998. His books Typography for Lawyers (typographyforlawyers.com) and Practical Typography (practicaltypography.com) are relied on daily by lawyers and writers worldwide. For more information, please visit https://buttericklaw.com.

SOURCE Joseph Saveri Law Firm LLP