“Wisdom does not always find me, so I try to embrace it when it does–even if it comes late, as it did here.” Judge Stephanos Bibas
“智慧并不总能找到我，所以当它出现时，我会试着拥抱它--即使它来得很晚，就像在这里一样。斯蒂芬诺斯-比巴斯法官
Yesterday, Circuit Judge Stephanos Bibas, sitting by designation in the District of Delaware, issued a ruling updating a previous summary judgment decision dismissing copyright infringement allegations made by Westlaw legal research service provider Thomson Reuters against a competing artificial intelligence (AI) search tool developed by Ross Intelligence. Among the top reconsiderations in Judge Bibas’ recent decision is his fair use analysis, which now recognizes the non-transformative nature of Ross’ use of copyrighted headnotes that summarize legal decisions.
昨天，特拉华州特拉华地区指定巡回法官斯蒂芬诺斯-比巴斯（Stephanos Bibas）做出裁决，更新了之前的简易判决，驳回了Westlaw法律研究服务提供商汤森路透对罗斯智能公司（Ross Intelligence）开发的人工智能（AI）竞争搜索工具提出的版权侵权指控。在比巴斯法官最近的判决中，最重要的重新考虑是他的合理使用分析，该分析现在承认了罗斯使用受版权保护的摘要法律判决的标题注释的非转换性质。
In September 2023, Judge Bibas issued a summary judgment ruling largely dismissing motions from both parties, concluding that most disputed issues had to be submitted to a jury. Among those issues was the breadth and validity of Thomson Reuters’ alleged copyright in its compilation registration for Westlaw headnotes, and Ross’ fair use defense. Although liability was ultimately left undecided by Judge Bibas on summary judgment, his ruling indicated that Ross’ use could be analogous to those from so-called “intermediate copying” case law, where copying of software source code was deemed transformative.
2023 年 9 月，比巴斯法官做出简易判决裁决，基本驳回了双方的动议，认为大多数争议问题必须提交给陪审团。这些问题包括汤森路透所称的 Westlaw 标题注释汇编注册版权的范围和有效性，以及罗斯的合理使用抗辩。虽然 Bibas 法官最终未就简易判决的责任作出决定，但他的裁决表明，Ross 的使用可能类似于所谓的 “中间复制 ”判例法，即复制软件源代码被视为具有转换性。
Westlaw Legal Headnotes Meet Low Threshold for Originality
Westlaw法律注释符合原创性的低门槛要求
“Wisdom does not always find me, so I try to embrace it when it does––even if it comes late, as it did here,” wrote Judge Bibas in this week’s updated summary judgment ruling. Studying case materials closely leading up to the August 2024 trial date, Judge Bibas invited new briefing from both parties after realizing that his first decision “had not gone far enough.” The new decision now grants most of Thomson Reuters’ motion for partial summary judgment on copyright infringement and fair use, while also denying Ross’ motion for summary judgment on fair use.
“比巴斯法官在本周更新的简易判决裁决中写道："智慧并不总能找到我，所以当它出现时，我会试着拥抱它--即使它来得很晚，就像在这里一样。在 2024 年 8 月开庭前，毕尔巴斯法官仔细研究了案件材料，在意识到自己的第一次判决 “不够深入 ”后，他邀请双方提交新的案情简报。现在，新的判决批准了汤森路透关于版权侵权和合理使用的部分简易判决动议的大部分内容，同时也驳回了罗斯关于合理使用的简易判决动议。
“The law is no longer a brooding omnipresence in the sky; it now dwells in legal research platforms,” wrote Judge Bibas, noting that Westlaw is the largest platform available online for accessing case law, statutes and related summaries. Contracting with legal services company LegalEase, Ross purchased about 25,000 bulk memos containing legal questions with good and bad answers developed from Westlaw headnotes and used those memos to train its AI search tool.
比巴斯法官写道：“法律不再是天空中无处不在的阴霾，它现在居住在法律研究平台上。”他指出，Westlaw 是目前最大的在线判例法、法规和相关摘要访问平台。罗斯与法律服务公司 LegalEase 签订合同，购买了约 25,000 份批量备忘录，其中包含从 Westlaw 标题注释中得出的法律问题及好坏答案，并使用这些备忘录来训练其人工智能搜索工具。
Comparing the bulk memo questions and the Westlaw headnotes side by side, Judge Bibas concluded that Ross infringed a total of 2,243 headnotes, the only remaining issue being whether copyright in those headnotes had expired. Revising his opinion from the 2023 summary judgment ruling, Judge Bibas now found enough originality in Westlaw’s headnotes to find no genuine dispute on that fact.
比巴斯法官将批量备忘录问题与 Westlaw 标题注释并列比较后得出结论，罗斯公司共侵犯了 2,243 份标题注释，唯一剩下的问题是这些标题注释的版权是否已过期。比巴斯法官修改了 2023 年即决判决书中的意见，认为 Westlaw 的标题注释具有足够的独创性，在这一事实上不存在真正的争议。
“More than that, each headnote is an individual, copyrightable work. That became clear to me once I analogized the lawyer’s editorial judgment to that of a sculptor. A block of raw marble, like a judicial opinion, is not copyrightable. Yet a sculptor creates a sculpture by choosing what to cut away and what to leave in place.” – Judge Bibas
“不仅如此，每条标题注释都是独立的、受版权保护的作品。当我把律师的编辑判断类比为雕刻家的判断时，我就明白了这一点。一块未加工的大理石，就像一份司法意见书，是不可受版权保护的。然而，雕刻家通过选择哪些部分要切掉，哪些部分要保留，来创作雕塑作品"。- 比巴斯法官
Bibas also found originality in Westlaw’s Key Number System for categorizing legal holdings, but noted that factual disputes remained as to Ross’ use of that system. The opinion found actual copying involved with 80% of the Westlaw headnotes at issue on summary judgment, noting that 20% of the batch, or 587 headnotes, were used for later validation and not the infringing AI model training. He also found substantial similarity between Ross’ bulk memo questions, which closely tracked the language of the Westlaw headnotes at issue. Ross’ raised several copyright defenses, including innocent infringement and scenes à faire, that failed as a matter in this revised opinion.
Bibas 还认定 Westlaw 用于对法律依据进行分类的关键编号系统具有独创性，但指出在罗斯使用该系统方面仍存在事实争议。意见书认为，在简易判决中，80% 的 Westlaw 标题涉及实际抄袭，并指出其中 20% 的批次（即 587 份标题）用于后期验证，而非侵权的人工智能模型训练。他还发现，罗斯的批量备忘录问题与涉案的 Westlaw 标题注释的语言非常相似。罗斯提出了几项版权抗辩，包括无辜侵权和场景侵权，但在本修订意见书中均告败诉。
No Transformative Use, Potential Market Impacts Derail Ross’ Fair Use Defense
没有转化性使用，潜在的市场影响破坏了罗斯的合理使用抗辩
Moving on to fair use, Judge Bibas found that Thomson Reuters prevailed on the doctrine’s application thanks in large part to reconsidering the application of the U.S. Supreme Court’s holding in Google v. Oracle America (2021) and Ninth Circuit case law on fair use in the context of analyzing computer programs. In those intermediate copying cases, the alleged defendant succeeded on fair use because computer code was copied in order to reverse engineer the uncopyrightable functionality of those software programs. Here, under the Supreme Court’s revised fair use standard from Andy Warhol Foundation for the Arts v. Goldsmith (2023), the broad purpose and character of Ross’ use created a competing legal service that was not transformative.
关于合理使用，比巴斯法官认为，汤森路透之所以能在合理使用原则的适用上获胜，在很大程度上要归功于重新考虑了美国最高法院在谷歌诉甲骨文美国公司案（2021 年）中的裁决以及第九巡回法院在分析计算机程序时关于合理使用的判例法的适用。在这些中间复制案件中，被控被告在合理使用方面胜诉，因为复制计算机代码是为了对这些软件程序的无版权功能进行反向工程。在本案中，根据最高法院根据安迪-沃霍尔艺术基金会诉戈德史密斯案（2023 年）修订的合理使用标准，罗斯使用的广泛目的和特征创造了一种竞争性的法律服务，而这种服务不具有转化性。
Factor two, the nature of Thomson Reuter’s original work, weighed in Ross’ favor with the caveat that this factor rarely plays a significant role in fair use determinations. Fair use factor three, the substantiality of the infringed portion of the copyrighted work, also weighed in Ross’ favor because Ross’ use in training its AI search tool did not make Westlaw headnotes available to the public. But factor four, “undoubtedly the single most important element of fair use” because it assesses impacts to the market for the original work, fell in Thomson Reuters’ favor. No longer a transformative use, Ross’ competing legal service product created enough of a potential impact on the market for AI training data to outweigh the public interest in access to the law asserted by Ross.
因素二--汤姆森路透公司原创作品的性质--对罗斯有利，但需要注意的是，这一因素在合理使用的裁定中很少发挥重要作用。合理使用因素三，即版权作品被侵权部分的实质性，也对 Ross 有利，因为 Ross 在训练其人工智能搜索工具时并未向公众提供 Westlaw 标题注释。但因素四 “无疑是合理使用最重要的一个因素”，因为它评估了对原作品市场的影响。罗斯的竞争性法律服务产品不再是一种转换性使用，它对人工智能训练数据市场造成的潜在影响足以超过罗斯所主张的获取法律的公共利益。
Judge Bibas’ decision did point out that this fair use analysis was confined to the non-generative AI service at issue in the case, which he chose to note due to rapid changes in the AI landscape. Still, this ruling will likely impact several high-profile copyright infringement cases between creators and generative AI developers currently winding their way through U.S. district court.
比巴斯法官在判决中确实指出，这种合理使用分析仅限于本案中涉及的非生成性人工智能服务，由于人工智能领域的快速变化，他选择了指出这一点。尽管如此，这一裁决仍可能会对目前正在美国地方法院审理的几起备受瞩目的创作者与生成式人工智能开发者之间的版权侵权案件产生影响。
Commenting on the case, Randy McCarthy of Hall Estill said in an emailed statement that, while the decision can still be overturned and is just “one battle in a larger war,” Bibas’ analysis of the fourth fair use factor could be significant. McCarthy explained:
Hall Estill 公司的兰迪-麦卡锡（Randy McCarthy）在一封电子邮件声明中对此案发表评论说，虽然这一判决仍有可能被推翻，而且只是 “一场更大战争中的一场战斗”，但毕巴斯对第四个合理使用因素的分析可能具有重要意义。麦卡锡解释道：
“The most important aspect of the opinion, to me, is the discussion of the fourth element of the fair use analysis. The Judge identifies this as the most important factor, and focuses upon the impacts upon the market for the original work. This is going to be heralded by existing groups of artists and content creators as the key to their case against the other generative AI systems.”
“对我来说，意见书中最重要的方面是对合理使用分析的第四个要素的讨论。法官认为这是最重要的因素，并把重点放在了对原作品市场的影响上。这将被现有的艺术家和内容创作者群体视为他们起诉其他生成式人工智能系统的关键所在。