# Seattle Times and Newsday Sue OpenAI and Microsoft

> Two major newspapers join the legal fight against AI tech giants, warning generative tools threaten the survival of journalism.
- Title: Seattle Times and Newsday Sue OpenAI and Microsoft — Shortify
- Summary: Two major newspapers join the legal fight against AI tech giants, warning generative tools threaten the survival of journalism. Publishers are escalating…
- Keywords: media, copyright, openai, microsoft, technology, startups, Seattle, Times, Newsday, Sue, TechCrunch
- Source: TechCrunch — https://techcrunch.com/2026/09/05/seattle-times-and-newsday-are-the-latest-publications-to-sue-openai-and-microsoft
- Author: Anthony Ha
- Published: 2026-09-05T22:49:55+00:00
- Read time: 1 min
- Topics: ai, media, copyright, openai, microsoft, technology, startups
## Publishers file new AI lawsuits
The Seattle Times and Newsday have joined a growing list of media outlets suing OpenAI and Microsoft for using copyrighted journalism to train AI models.
## Journalism faces existential threat
The filing warns that the news industry could become broken beyond repair if AI tools continue to ingest human journalism to build commercial products.

> Generative AI is a snake eating its own tail that could destroy the very organizations that produce the content it’s trained on.
## Devouring original reporting
Publishers argue that generative AI tools present themselves as content creators, but function primarily as commercial consumers of original reporting.

> AI products like ChatGPT and CoPilot are touted as producers of content, but in fact they are rapacious consumers, devouring human-authored content.
## Complicated existing partnerships
The legal action is particularly notable because Microsoft and OpenAI have previously funded journalism projects and fellowships for The Seattle Times.
## Tech giants express surprise
Microsoft responded to the filing by expressing surprise at the lawsuit, while maintaining that it remains open to sitting down with publishers to find solutions.
## Key takeaway

Publishers are escalating legal battles against AI companies, arguing that unauthorized content scraping threatens the foundation of human journalism.