The fundamental copyright question no one is asking

Much of the conversation around AI and copyright has focused on a simple question: Should content creators be compensated when their work is used to train and improve AI systems?

It's an important question especially given the scale and rapidity at which AI companies have scraped protected content for their own commercial purposes. To be clear, I believe the answer is yes. But that question may not be the most important one.

The more consequential question is what kind of incentives we are creating for the future of journalism, entertainment, and original content

For generations, copyright has often been framed as a mechanism for protecting creators. Increasingly, however, it is being discussed as an obstacle to innovation-something that must be loosened, reinterpreted, or worked around in order to accelerate the development of AI technologies. Hence, the AI companies persistent claims of fair use.

But that framing misses a fundamental point.

Copyright is not simply about protecting what has already been created. At its core, it is an investment framework. It exists because societies benefit when people and companies are willing to invest in producing new ideas, new reporting, new stories, and new forms of creative expression.

Copyright is an investment framework, not a barrier to innovation

America's Founders understood this principle from the beginning. As James Madison wrote in Federalist No. 43, "The public good fully coincides in both cases with the claims of individuals." In other words, society benefits when creators have incentives to create. By including copyright protections in the Constitution, they recognized that a thriving marketplace of ideas depends on incentives that encourage people and companies to invest in creating new works.

Copyright was conceived not merely as a reward for what has already been produced, but as an investment mechanism for ensuring that creation continues. That distinction matters because the AI debate is often framed as a conflict between innovation and intellectual property. In reality, both are essential components of the same innovation ecosystem.

Every AI model requires investment. Companies spend billions of dollars on computing infrastructure, data centers, chips, energy, engineering talent, and research. These investments are widely recognized as necessary inputs into innovation, and markets have developed mechanisms to value them accordingly.

Original content is also an essential input.

Content creation is one of America's most valuable economic assets

Investigative journalism, expert analysis, premium entertainment, sports coverage, documentary filmmaking, and professional storytelling do not emerge automatically. They require capital, talent, expertise, and long-term commitment. They require organizations willing to make investments whose returns may be uncertain and whose value often emerges only over time.

According to a study released in February 2025, copyright-based industries accounted for over 12% of the U.S. economy and 63% of the U.S. digital economy. From 2020 to 2023, these industries outpaced U.S. economic growth almost threefold. In the digital sector alone, copyright-based industries employ 56.6%of all employees in the digital sector. The annual compensation paid to core copyright workers is approximately 50%higher than the average U.S. annual wage. As for the global impact, the sales of select U.S. copyrighted products in overseas markets amounted to $272.6 billion, which exceeded the sales of other IP industries including pharmaceuticals, agriculture, and aerospace.

Simply put, content creation is a unique strength of the American economy.

The question policymakers should be asking is not whether AI should have access to information. Nor is it whether innovation should continue. The question is whether the economic signals being sent by the marketplace encourage continued investment in the creation of original content.

Content creation is critical for the AI economy

If those signals weaken, the consequences will not be immediate. Newsrooms will not disappear overnight. Entertainment companies will not suddenly stop producing content. But over time, investment decisions change. Resources shift. Fewer risks are taken. Fewer journalists are hired. Fewer stories are pursued. Fewer original works are created. Consider the current media landscape. How many local news outlets have been launched since social media platforms soaked up all of the local advertising dollars? Given that Google Zero is shutting off the flow of traffic, is it an intriguing business challenge to launch a new media website?

The result is not simply a challenge for publishers. It is a challenge for the broader information ecosystem, ironically including AI companies, that increasingly depends on high-quality content as its foundation.

This is why the copyright discussion should not be reduced to questions of compensation alone. Compensation in the form of licensing and other mechanisms matters as well as the enforcement of antitrust laws to ensure a level playing field. But the larger issue is sustainability.

What incentives exist for future creation? Are we creating the right dynamic for companies and individuals to make long-term investments in trusted content? And what kind of information ecosystem do we want to encourage over the next decade?

These are not questions about protecting the past. They are questions about shaping the future.

AG Sulzberger recently gave a powerful speech about "AI, Journalism and the Uncertain Future of the Public Square," where he noted that "tech companies should also want to support the healthy, sustainable flow of the information and ideas and creativity that powers A.I. - to ensure their actions don't lead us to a tragedy of the civic commons."

As policymakers, courts, technology companies, and content creators continue to debate the rules governing AI, it is worth remembering that innovation does not begin with technology alone. It begins with human creativity, original reporting, expert knowledge, and storytelling.

The challenge before us is not choosing between innovation and intellectual property. It is ensuring that the next era of innovation continues to reward both.