Perplexity AI CEO's Offer to Aid NYT During Tech Strike Sparks Controversy

Perplexity AI CEO offers to help NY Times overcome tech strike -- ...

The boss of controversial startup Perplexity AI made a bizarre offer to help The New York Times while its tech workers our out in strike -- just weeks after the Gray Lady threatened to sue the company for "unlawful use" of its articles. Aravind Srinivas, the CEO of the Jeff Bezos-backed startup, raised eyebrows with his response Monday to a post on X from Times publisher AG Sulzberger that assured staffers that the work stoppage would not impact the publication's Election Day coverage. "Hey AG Sulzberger @nytimes - sorry to see this," Srinivas wrote on X. "Perplexity is on standby to help ensure your essential coverage is available to all through the election. DM me anytime here." Srinivas had to quickly clarify his comment after facing backlash that his offer was tantamount to crossing the picket line of the 600-strong Tech Guild, which went on strike the day before the election. "To be clear, the offer was not to 'replace' journalists or engineers with AI but to provide technical infra support on a high-traffic day," Srinivas wrote. A Perplexity spokesperson referred The Post to Srinivas' comments on X. The Times and Times Tech Guild were not immediately available for comment. "It's pretty gross to suggest this but these AI guys really don't fundamentally understand the damage they're doing to key institutions so it's quite on brand," New York-based reporter Andy Hirschfeld wrote on X. Another user accused Srinivas of "disgusting bootlicking behavior." Last month, lawyers for the Times fired off a cease-and-desist letter to Perplexity AI demanding that it stop using its content. "Perplexity and its business partners have been unjustly enriched by using, without authorization, The Times's expressive, carefully written and researched, and edited journalism without a license," the Times wrote in its letter to the tech firm that looks to challenge Google's search engine dominance. The letter, which alleged that Perplexity circumvented its anti-scraping and anti-bot protections against use of its content, gave the company an Oct. 30 deadline to respond. A week after the Times threatened legal action, The Post and Dow Jones filed suit against Perplexity alleging copyright infringement. "Perplexity is a generative artificial intelligence company that claims to provide its users accurate and up-to-date news and information in a platform that, in Perplexity's own words, allows users to 'Skip the Links' to original publishers' websites," the companies said in the federal lawsuit. "Perplexity attempts to accomplish this by engaging in a massive amount of illegal copying of publishers' copyrighted works and diverting customers and critical revenues away from those copyright holders." The Post and Dow Jones, both of which are subsidiaries of News Corp, said in their filing that they "seek redress for Perplexity's brazen scheme to compete for readers while simultaneously freeriding on the valuable content the publishers produce." Tech Guild members, meanwhile, resumed picketing outside Times offices in Midtown Manhattan on Tuesday morning. "We know this is a hard day to be on strike for our members but we want to be clear: We are here because of the decisions of @NYTimes management," the union wrote in an X post on Tuesday. A Times spokesperson told The Post on Monday: "We look forward to continuing to work with the Tech Guild to reach a fair contract that takes into account that they are already among the highest paid individual contributors in the Company and journalism is our top priority."

Perplexity CEO offers AI company's services to replace striking NYT staff

The CEO of AI search company Perplexity, Aravind Srinivas, has offered to cross picket lines and provide services to mitigate the effect of a strike by New York Times tech workers. The NYT Tech Guild announced its strike Monday, after setting November 4 as its deadline months earlier. The workers represented provide software support and data analysis for the Times, on the business side of the outlet. They have been asking for an annual 2.5% wage increase and to cement a current two days per week in-office expectation, among other things. "But the company has decided that our members aren't worth enough to agree to a fair contract and stop committing unfair labor practices," the guild wrote on X. "They have left us no choice but to demonstrate the power of our labor on the picket line," said Kathy Zhang, the organization's unit chair, in a statement. The NYT's publisher, AG Sulzberger, criticized a strike two days ahead of the U.S. presidential election, saying in a statement, "Hundreds of millions of people are depending on The Times's journalism on Election Day and afterward, and it is troubling that the Tech Guild would try to block this public service at such a consequential moment for our country." Picketers demonstrated in front of the NYT building in New York as negotiations continued. Meanwhile, on X, formerly known as Twitter, Perplexity's CEO offered to step in for the striking workers. Replying to Semafor media editor Max Tani quoting the publisher, Srinivas wrote: "Hey AG Sulzberger @nytimes sorry to see this. Perplexity is on standby to help ensure your essential coverage is available to all through the election. DM me anytime here." Many on X immediately castigated Srinivas for acting as a scab -- a derogatory term for people willing to perform the jobs of striking workers. It is widely considered a disreputable behavior in matters of labor and equity. By undercutting collective action, scabs limit the ability of workers to bargain with those in positions of power. Srinivas may simply be trying to make sure people have the information they need on election day. The company has lately unveiled its own elections info hub and map. But to offer its services explicitly as a replacement for striking workers was bound to be an unpopular move. Though TechCrunch asked Perplexity for comment, Srinivas responded to TechCrunch's post on X saying that "the offer was *not* to 'replace' journalists or engineers with AI but to provide technical infra support on a high-traffic day." The striking workers in question, however, are the ones who provide that service to the NYT. It's not really clear what services other than AI tools Perplexity could offer, or why they would not amount to replacing the workers in question. (However, in response to the clarification, we have opted to change the headline to reflect the claim that this offer was not necessarily specific to AI services.) The NYT and Perplexity aren't exactly on the best of terms right now. The Times sent Perplexity a cease and desist letter in October over the startup's scraping of articles for use by its AI models. In a conversation last week with TechCrunch, the normally outspoken CEO declined to define "plagiarism."

Perplexity AI Offers to Help New York Times With Tech Union Strike

New York Times tech workers are on strike for fairer pay and just cause job protections. In steps the CEO of Perplexity, an AI company that has repeatedly ripped-off the work of human journalists. On Monday and a day before Election Day, tech workers for the New York Times went on strike seeking to secure a contract with fairer pay and just cause job protections. In response Aravind Srinivas, the CEO of AI search engine Perplexity, tweeted that the chairman of the New York Times company AG Sulzberger should contact him for assistance during the strike. It's unclear exactly what services Srinivas is offering Sulzberger, but it appears that the CEO of an AI company is trying to help the Times bypass its human workers who are currently in the middle of an authorized labor strike. The offer is especially ironic given Perplexity's repeated cases of lifting and regurgitating human journalists' work without credit. Earlier this year Forbes found that the AI service was using much of its original investigative reporting without credit. And last month Dow Jones and the New York Post sued Perplexity, alleging "massive" copyright infringement. "Hey AG Sulzberger @nytimes - sorry to see this," Srinivas tweeted in response to a Sulzberger email saying the strike would likely continue through the election. "Perplexity is on standby to help ensure your essential coverage is available to all through the election. DM me anytime here." Perplexity offers an AI-powered search engine which, like many others, is built in part by scraping information and material from the web. WIRED previously found that Perplexity was scraping sites without permission, and plagiarizing multiple articles. In a statement published on Monday, the NewsGuild of NY and the Times Tech Guild said that the latter "has walked off the job in a ULP strike that threatens Election Day." The Times Tech Guild is the union "that powers the technology behind election coverage at The New York Times," the statement added. Throughout Monday, members have been picketing outside The New York Times building. The statement asked New York Times readers to honor the digital picket line and not play New York Times' owned games such as Wordle. "Throughout the bargaining process, Times management has engaged in numerous labor law violations, including implementing return-to-office mandates without bargaining and attempting to intimidate members through interrogations about their strike intentions," the statement continued. "The NewsGuild of NY has filed unfair labor practice charges against The Times on these tactics as well as numerous other violations of labor law." On Monday, The New York Times announced it had passed 11 million subscribers. Perplexity did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Neither did the NewsGuild of NY.

Perplexity CEO offers to replace striking NYT staff with AI

The CEO of AI search company Perplexity, Aravind Srinivas, has offered to cross a virtual picket line and provide services during a strike by New York Times tech workers. The NYT Tech Guild announced its strike today, having said for months that this was the deadline. "But the company has decided that our members aren't worth enough to agree to a fair contract and stop committing unfair labor practices," the guild wrote on X. "They have left us no choice but to demonstrate the power of our labor on the picket line," said Kathy Zhang, the organization's unit chair, in a statement. The workers represented by the guild provide software support and data analysis for the Times, on the business side of the outlet. They have been asking for an annual 2.5 percent wage, and cementing the current two days per week in-office expectation, among other things. The NYT's publisher, AG Sulzberger, criticized a strike at such a crucial time for the paper, saying in a statement that "Hundreds of millions of people are depending on The Times's journalism on Election Day and afterward, and it is troubling that the Tech Guild would try to block this public service at such a consequential moment for our country." While negotiations continue, picketers demonstrated in front of the NYT building in New York. On X, formerly known as Twitter, though, Perplexity's CEO offered to step in for the striking workers. Replying to Semafor media editor Max Tani quoting the publisher, Srinivas wrote: "Hey AG Sulzberger @nytimes sorry to see this. Perplexity is on standby to help ensure your essential coverage is available to all through the election. DM me anytime here." There's no sense mincing words here: Srinivas is acting as a scab -- a derogatory term for people willing to perform the jobs of striking workers. It is widely considered a disreputable behavior in matters of labor and equity. By undercutting collective action, scabs limit the ability of workers to bargain with those in positions of power. Srinivas may simply be trying to make sure people have the information they need on election day -- the company has lately unveiled its own elections info hub and map. But to offer its services explicitly as a replacement for striking workers is bound to be an unpopular move. This story is developing. Check back soon for updates.

Perplexity AI CEO Suggests Replacing Striking NYT Workers With AI

As employees strike at The New York Times, a tech CEO is suggesting the newspaper use AI to temporarily replace protesting human workers. Perplexity AI CEO Aravind Srinivas today tweeted to the Times' leadership about using his company's AI to keep the newspaper's site online as results come in for tomorrow's US election. In response to a tweet about NYT Publisher AG Sulzberger arguing that a NYT Tech Guild strike on Election Day is "troubling...at such a consequential moment for our country," Srinivas wrote: "Sorry to see this. Perplexity is on standby to help ensure your essential coverage is available to all through the election. DM me anytime here." Srinivas' tweet is facing criticism for recommending that AI be used as a strikebreaker or a "scab" to replace workers who are on strike. Over 600 employees belonging to the New York Times Tech Guild -- many of them software developers at the newspaper -- have walked off the job to demand better worker protections, a pay increase, and defined remote work privileges. "You know what else is essential? Paying and treating your workers fairly. This is repulsive," one user wrote in response to Srinivas' tweet. The offer from Srinivas shows that AI could go beyond simply taking jobs away from humans to undermine worker solidarity and bargaining power. The Times didn't immediately respond to a request for comment. But it's doubtful the newspaper will consider the offer. Last month, the Times sent a cease-and-desist letter to Perplexity AI, claiming the company had been unlawfully scraping the newspaper's content for its own AI services. In response, Perplexity's CEO said his goal was to collaborate with the Times, noting; "We have no interest in being anyone's antagonist here." Perplexity is perhaps best known for its AI-powered search engine, but it's also been selling AI-related services to help businesses boost their productivity. On Monday, Perplexity also launched an election hub to keep US voters informed.