{"id":264763,"date":"2026-06-05T05:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-06-05T09:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/2026\/06\/05\/if-ai-needs-your-work-to-function-its-not-fair-use\/"},"modified":"2026-06-05T06:45:37","modified_gmt":"2026-06-05T10:45:37","slug":"if-ai-needs-your-work-to-function-its-not-fair-use","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/2026\/06\/05\/if-ai-needs-your-work-to-function-its-not-fair-use\/","title":{"rendered":"If AI needs your work to function, it\u2019s not ‘fair use’"},"content":{"rendered":"

If AI needs your work to function, it\u2019s not ‘fair use’<\/a><\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/op-eds\/4595633\/if-artificial-intelligence-needs-your-work-to-function-its-not-fair-use\/<\/a><\/p>\n

Publish Date: 2026-06-05 05:00:00<\/a><\/p>\n

Source Domain: www.washingtonexaminer.com<\/a><\/p>\n

Artificial intelligence doesn\u2019t create in a vacuum. Rather, it depends on human work to analyze data, discovering patterns and finding anomalies. That work is essential for AI\u2019s machine learning. Therefore, categorizing such work as \u201cfair use\u201d misses the point.<\/p>\n

As artificial intelligence rapidly advances, a fundamental question is emerging: What happens to creators\u2019 rights \u2014 journalists, artists, statisticians \u2014 when their work becomes essential fuel for AI systems?<\/p>\n

The original purpose of copyright is, simply, a matter of control. Copyright law ensures creators, not downstream users, capture the value of their work \u2014 an idea that becomes even more critical when that work is used at scale. These creators \u2014 authors, artists, and innovators \u2014 have the right to determine how their work is used, distributed, and monetized. That principle does not disappear simply because content is ingested into an AI model. These systems rely on vast amounts of existing writing, art, and code created by humans. If that material is necessary for the system to function, then the rights of those creators should remain firmly in place.<\/p>\n

As AI accelerates, the demand for legal clarity is outpacing the development of case law, creating a kind of digital Wild West where the rules haven\u2019t caught up to reality. Any claim that AI training qualifies as \u201cfair use\u201d misunderstands what is actually happening. Training a model is an active process of using copyrighted material to build a new product. Without that material, the system would not exist in its current form.<\/p>\n

Allowing companies to use protected works in this way permits them to absorb, repurpose, and possibly monetize creative output without consent or compensation. Luckily, the courts are beginning to recognize and weigh in on this distinction.<\/p>\n

In Thomson Reuters v. ROSS Intelligence, a federal judge ruled that using copyrighted material to train an AI system can be infringement, rejecting a fair use…<\/p>\n

Source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If AI needs your work to function, it\u2019s not ‘fair use’ https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/op-eds\/4595633\/if-artificial-intelligence-needs-your-work-to-function-its-not-fair-use\/ Publish Date: 2026-06-05…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":264764,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/iStock-2217030312-e1777037717494.jpg?resize=1200,683","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-264763","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-artificial-intelligence"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/264763"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=264763"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/264763\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":264765,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/264763\/revisions\/264765"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/264764"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=264763"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=264763"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=264763"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}