New York Times and Amazon ink surprising new AI deal

The Times previously sued OpenAI for copyright infringement, but it's okay this time because it's getting paid.

By Emma Keates | May 29, 2025 | 10:58am

Image: New York Times and Amazon logos

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New York Times and Amazon ink surprising new AI deal

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Rarely does one get a clearer picture of our rapidly changing times than in The New York Times‘ brief announcement of their AI licensing deal with Amazon today. “The New York Times Company has agreed to license its editorial content to Amazon for use in the tech giant’s artificial intelligence platforms, the company said on Thursday,” the announcement opens. The agreement “will bring Times editorial content” including news articles and content from NYT Cooking and The Athletic “to a variety of Amazon customer experiences,” it continues. This is the first time that NYT has agreed to any sort of licensing arrangement with a focus on generative AI. Editorial content can now appear on Alexa smart speakers, and it will be used to train Amazon’s proprietary AI models.

The real kicker comes in the announcement’s fourth paragraph. “In 2023, The Times sued OpenAI and its partner, Microsoft, for copyright infringement, accusing the tech companies of using millions of articles published by The Times to train automated chatbots without any kind of compensation. OpenAI and Microsoft have rejected those accusations,” it reads.

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If you can’t beat ’em, you can at least get paid by ’em. “The deal is consistent with our long-held principle that high-quality journalism is worth paying for,” Meredith Kopit Levien, chief executive of The Times, wrote in a note to staff. “It aligns with our deliberate approach to ensuring that our work is valued appropriately, whether through commercial deals or through the enforcement of our intellectual property rights.” While other companies continue to fight the AI industry in court, we may see more of this mutually beneficial approach as the war rages on.