Robert Van Nest sent a letter to Judge Araceli Martínez-Olguín in the In re OpenAI ChatGPT Litigation indicating OpenAI’s intent to seek a transfer to the Multidistrict Litigation (MDL), which, if OpenAI’s petition is granted, would then oversee all 8 copyright-related lawsuits against OpenAI from the Northern District of California and the Southern District of New for the purposes of discovery and pretrial proceedings.
The MDL court could also hold a bellwether trial to get a result in some of the cases, which then might give the parties important information about the strength or weakness of their positions–and possible settlement–before the cases are sent back to the original courts in which the cases were filed.
For discovery purposes, OpenAI has already sought coordinated depositions in the copyright cases it is facing in two jurisdictions, meaning it wants to have its witnesses each subject to one deposition (instead of several). That does make a lot of sense.
For summary judgment, MDL would avoid the potential inconsistent results on the issue of fair use in the training of AI models. Of course, if an MDL court denies summary judgment on that issue, the fair use issue would have to be tried in the original courts at trial.
In its letter, OpenAI says it is not seeking a stay of the cases in the Northern District of California or the Southern District of New York, pending a decision from the MDL panel.
Here are the 8 cases that would be affected:
- In re OpenAI ChatGPT Litigation: Tremblay, Silverman, Chabon [book authors]
- Millette v. OpenAI [YouTube creators]
- Authors Guild v. Open AI and Alter v. OpenAI, Microsoft; Basbanes v. Microsoft [book authors]
- New York Times v. Microsoft [newspapers]
- Daily News v. Microsoft [newspapers]
- The Center for Investigative Reporting, Inc. v. OpenAI [newspapers]
- Raw Story Media, Inc. v. OpenAI [online media]
- Intercept Media Inc. v. OpenAI [online media]