Meta Wins Key Lawsuit on Copyright and AI Training
Today we're talking about a topic that's generating a lot of buzz among digital creatives, designers, and, of course, AI users: Meta has just won an important lawsuit on copyright in the context of AI model training. Yes, we're talking about that practice where big tech companies use tons of text to feed their artificial intelligences without asking permission from the original authors.
In this case, 13 writers had sued Meta claiming that their AI, known as Llama, had been trained on their books without authorization. Judge Vince Chhabria has ruled that Meta is entitled to summary judgment thanks to its defense based on the so-called fair use.
What Does This Ruling Really Mean?
The key point is that the judge didn't say that using copyrighted works to train an AI is legal in all cases. He only made it clear that, in this specific case, the plaintiffs failed to argue their position effectively. According to the judge, the writers did not demonstrate that Llama was capable of generating enough text to constitute a serious infringement, nor that their works have a legitimate market as AI training material. In other words, the problem wasn't so much what Meta did, but how the plaintiffs defended their case.
The Creative and Technical Context Behind the News
This leaves all of us who work in creative environments—from modeling in Blender to rendering in V-Ray or animation in Houdini—thinking. Many of us share tutorials, resources, and original content that could end up, unknowingly, in databases for generative AI. The ruling also references another recent decision related to Anthropic, where a judge reached a similar conclusion: if the AI is trained on legal copies of books, it is also considered fair use.
So now you know, while you spend hours tweaking nodes in Substance Painter or doing UV mapping in Maya, your next project might end up being breakfast for some AI that then gives you back something like: Here’s your own style... but made by me. How nice the future is, right? 🤖