The coalition of the willing (and unable): publishers rally to wall off AI’s free ride

More than 80 media executives huddled in New York last week under the IAB Tech Lab banner to tackle a problem that’s fast becoming existential: how to block AI companies scraping publisher content to train their models and capture attention — all without consent, let alone a check. 

The usual suspects showed up — publishers, platforms and the tech vendors caught in between. Even Google and Meta attended. The AI companies at the centre of this storm — OpenAI, Anthropic and Perplexity — did not. No one was surprised. But their absence landed louder than any statement. 

“Publishers are still very much concerned about whether those companies are even going to participate, which is why the consensus in the room was we have to block them,” said Anthony Katsur, CEO of the IAB Tech Lab. 

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