A U.S. judicial panel ruled on Thursday to consolidate multiple high-profile copyright lawsuits against OpenAI and its primary investor, Microsoft, in a Manhattan federal court.
The decision by the U.S. Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation moves California-based lawsuits—filed by authors such as Ta-Nehisi Coates and comedian Sarah Silverman—into the same jurisdiction as similar cases brought by The New York Times and renowned writers including John Grisham, Jonathan Franzen, and George R.R. Martin.
While OpenAI had pushed for the cases to be centralized in Northern California, most of the plaintiffs opposed the move.
"We welcome this decision and are eager to demonstrate in court that our models are trained on publicly accessible data, align with fair use principles, and foster innovation," an OpenAI spokesperson stated.
The New York Times attorney, Steven Lieberman of Rothwell Figg, responded by asserting the company’s commitment to proving that OpenAI and Microsoft engaged in "widespread theft" of its intellectual property. Microsoft declined to comment.
The lawsuits form part of a broader wave of legal battles targeting OpenAI, Microsoft, and Meta, with copyright owners alleging that AI firms used protected materials without consent to train their language models.
Courts are now beginning to examine whether these companies are shielded by the U.S. copyright law’s "fair use" doctrine, which permits certain unauthorized uses of copyrighted content.
Last year, OpenAI requested the consolidation of 12 lawsuits, arguing they all revolved around the same fundamental claim—that the company used copyrighted works to train its AI models. However, plaintiffs contended that their cases varied too much to justify centralization.
On Thursday, the panel determined that grouping the cases under U.S. District Judge Sidney Stein would "serve the convenience of the parties and witnesses and promote the just and efficient conduct of this litigation." Judge Stein currently oversees the New York Times and author-led lawsuits.