Source: CBC News 

CBC News reports that a Vancouver-based author is leading a significant class-action lawsuit against major artificial intelligence companies, alleging widespread copyright infringement. The lawsuit, filed on behalf of a collective of Canadian authors and creators, claims that these AI firms unlawfully used their copyrighted books and other written works to train their large language models without permission, credit, or compensation. This legal action is one of several similar suits filed globally, but it represents a key front in the battle over intellectual property rights in Canada's evolving technological landscape. 

The core of the legal argument is that the process of "scraping" vast amounts of internet data, including copyrighted material, to build commercial AI products constitutes a violation of the Copyright Act. The authors contend that their creative works are the foundation upon which these profitable AI models are built, and they should therefore be compensated for their contribution. The outcome of this class-action lawsuit could have profound implications for the future of AI development in Canada, potentially setting a crucial precedent for how creative content is used to train artificial intelligence systems and defining the balance between technological innovation and the rights of creators.