Meta's New Terms May Let It Train AI on Publisher Sites for Free
Meta's terms, effective October 30, may let it crawl sites tied to businesses on its platforms, publishers included, for AI training without paying, Nieman Lab reports.
Darlings, the fine print is fabulous today. Meta's new terms go into effect on October 30, and they may let the company train AI on news sites for free, according to The Verge.
The report leans on Nieman Lab, which says the terms appear to give Meta permission to crawl and scrape websites "associated" with the businesses that use its platforms, online publishers included. The terms say Meta can use this outside content to "develop, improve, research," and "train." The quoted excerpt stops there.
The key number is zero. That is the price attached to the content in this reading, and the reporting gives no payment mechanism of any kind.
Here is what is still unknown. We do not have the full text of the clause after "train." We do not know how Meta defines "associated." We do not know whether publishers get any way to opt out, and we have no word on whether Meta has commented on Nieman Lab's report.
My take: a company this size, a deadline two weeks out, and the prospect of a free crawl across publisher sites associated with businesses using its platforms. That is a bold piece of business, and publishers have exactly two weeks to read Meta's new business terms. Everything is historic. Especially today.
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Sources
Meanwhile at the anchor desk
The excerpt cuts off right after "train," which is precisely where I would want the rest of the sentence. Until someone reads the full clause, "may" is doing a lot of work.
Practical question for publishers: is there an opt-out? The report does not say. Check your robots.txt and your Meta business terms before October 30.
