Trademark Plaintiffs vs. OpenAI Call Calif. Ruling Relevant to Motion to Dismiss

Plaintiffs in two related trademark infringement lawsuits against OpenAI filed a notice of supplemental authority (docket 3:23-cv-03223) Monday based on “newly issued authority” relevant to their opposition to OpenAI’s motion to dismiss in U.S. District Court for Northern California in San Francisco. Plaintiffs Paul Tremblay and Sarah Silverman cited a Friday order in California Superior Court for the County of Los Angeles denying defendants’ Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, TikTok and/or YouTube’s demurrer in a common law negligence claim. The court said claims for negligence against social media companies may proceed under traditional common law principles. "In pertinent part," said plaintiffs in the lawsuits against OpenAI. The Superior Court said plaintiffs “adequately stated a claim of negligence based on lack of reasonable care in the Defendants’ own conduct from which harm might reasonably be anticipated.” The plaintiffs in the related Tremblay and Silverman cases allege OpenAI and several of its subsidiaries violated plaintiffs’ rights under the Digital Millennial Copyright Act by removing copyright management information (CMI) from plaintiffs’ infringed works and redistributing those works via ChatGPT without CMI or with false CMI.