Meta Secures News Corp Content for AI Training
Meta just inked a multimillion-dollar AI licensing pact with News Corp, unlocking a massive vault of content from
The Wall Street Journal and other major media brands. The deal lets Meta feed its chatbots with vetted journalism and train its next-gen
Artificial Intelligence models directly on the publisher's archives.
According to The Wall Street Journal, Meta is handing News Corp up to $50 million a year over a three-year term. The deal scoops up content from The Journal alongside the conglomerate's wider portfolio of brands across the US and UK. A Meta spokesperson confirmed the agreement.
The "Woo and a Sue" Publisher Strategy
For News Corp, this latest licensing pact sits alongside a streak of highly profitable
Business News tied to monetizing its intellectual property. The publisher previously hammered out a five-year deal with OpenAI worth roughly $250 million.
Speaking at Morgan Stanley's annual Technology, Media & Telecom (TMT) conference, News Corp CEO Robert Thomson said the media giant is already in "advanced stages with other negotiations." Thomson summed up the company’s aggressive IP playbook in the AI era as a "woo and a sue" strategy.
It's a simple split between AI developers willing to write a check and those who scrape data without asking. "We'll woo you. We'd like you to be our partner," Thomson explained. "But if you're stealing our stuff, we are going to sue you. So there'll be a discount for those who hand themselves in, and there'll be a penalty for those that resist."
Meta's Growing Roster of Media Partners
The News Corp agreement arrives as
Meta reshuffles its internal AI teams, pouring resources into its next flagship model. Locking down verified, high-quality training data is now a top priority for the social media giant.
News Corp joins a fast-growing roster of approved data partners. In recent months, Meta has signed multi-year agreements with major outlets including USA Today, People, CNN, and Fox News.
By building formal data pipelines with established media organizations, Meta hopes to combat hallucinations and ground its models in reality. According to the company, threading these trusted sources into its architecture will "improve Meta AI’s ability to deliver timely and relevant content and information with a wide variety of viewpoints and content types."
