Amazon and The New York Times (NYT) signed a licensing agreement to bring the newspaper’s content to Amazon’s AI services and products, including Alexa+. With this agreement, Amazon has gained access to news, recipes, and sports content across its AI platforms, including Alexa and machine learning models. The multi-year deal covers the newspaper’s flagship news operation, as well as content from NYT Cooking and The Athletic.
The Agreement Will Bring New York Times Content to Amazon Customer Experiences
The NYT announced that its editorial content would appear on various platforms, including Amazon’s AI assistant and chatbot, Alexa+. The financial details and duration of the agreement have not been disclosed. A statement from The New York Times noted that “the agreement will bring NYT editorial content to various Amazon customer experiences.” The deal covers not only news articles, but also NYT Cooking (the newspaper’s food and recipe platform) and its sports-focused publication, The Athletic.
NYT CEO Meredith Kopit Levien said, “This agreement aligns with our long-held belief in the value of quality journalism. Whether through commercial partnerships or by enforcing our intellectual property rights, it reflects our deliberate approach to ensuring our work is appropriately valued.”
Alexa’s Capabilities Will Be Further Enhanced
As part of Alexa’s AI transformation, Amazon had promised that the new version would be “a smarter, more conversational, and more capable voice assistant.” With the agreement, Alexa’s capabilities will be further enhanced. Accordingly, the deal allows summaries and excerpts to be displayed in real time on Amazon devices and services. In addition, Amazon is permitted to use the content to train its foundational models.
NYT Files Copyright Lawsuits Against AI Platforms
The New York Times is known for filing a lawsuit against OpenAI over copyright infringement. Noted for its strong stance against AI licensing, the NYT filed a copyright lawsuit against OpenAI and Microsoft in December 2023. It accused both companies of using millions of NYT articles without permission to train AI models. The lawsuit claimed, “OpenAI and Microsoft have built a business worth tens of billions of dollars by using humanity’s work without authorization.”
