In a significant ruling on Wednesday, a federal judge backed Meta in a contentious lawsuit filed by 13 authors, including comedian Sarah Silverman. The lawsuit claimed that Meta improperly trained its AI models using copyrighted materials from these writers' books.

Federal Judge Vince Chhabria delivered a summary judgment, allowing him to resolve the case without a jury. He ruled that Meta's practices fell under the 'fair use' doctrine of copyright law, thereby deeming them legal. This decision adds to a recent trend where tech giants are gradually winning their battles against media firms over the legality of using copyrighted content to train AI.

However, both Chhabria's and another judge's recent rulings are not the sweeping victories the tech industry might have wanted. The judges emphasized the limited scope of these rulings, making it clear that they do not establish a blanket legality for all AI training on copyrighted works.

Judge Chhabria specifically stated that just because he ruled in favor of Meta, it doesn’t mean all uses of copyrighted material for AI training are lawful. He pointed out that in this case, the plaintiffs presented weak arguments and insufficient evidence to support their claims. He stated, “This ruling does not mean that Meta's use of copyrighted materials to train its language models is lawful.” He suggested that future cases with more compelling evidence could lead to different outcomes.

A critical aspect of the ruling was Judge Chhabria's determination that Meta’s use of the copyrighted works was transformative—it didn’t simply replicate the authors’ books. The plaintiffs also struggled to demonstrate that Meta’s activities harmed their market, a crucial element in evaluating copyright infringement. Chhabria remarked, “The plaintiffs presented no meaningful evidence on market dilution at all.”

While both Meta and Anthropic have had recent successes involving AI model training on books, the legal landscape remains complicated. Numerous lawsuits persist against various tech firms. For instance, The New York Times is taking legal action against OpenAI and Microsoft for allegedly using their articles to train AI, while Disney and Universal are suing Midjourney over similar claims regarding films and TV shows.

Judge Chhabria noted that defenses based on fair use depend heavily on the specifics of each case, suggesting that some types of works, like news articles, may be even more susceptible to competition from AI-generated content.

This ruling could set important precedents in the ongoing dialogue between creative industries and technological advancements, paving the way for future legal battles.