The case Like Company v. Google Ireland Ltd. provides an opportunity to examine key legal challenges at the intersection of generative AI and press publishers’ rights. The referral to the ECJ focuses in particular on the scope of protection for journalistic content against AI-based content scraping. It highlights that the current European legal framework—especially the TDM exception—has struggled to keep pace with rapid technological developments since 2019. The ECJ is therefore well advised to engage with the technical nuances of such technologies and to incorporate them appropriately into its reasoning. These issues extend beyond press publishers’ rights and are increasingly relevant to general copyright law and international private law within the context of global innovation ecosystems. However, the questions referred will not be able to resolve all outstanding issues related to AI and copyright. In addition to conceptual shortcomings of the current legal regime, broader concerns emerge—such as the protection of human creativity and the preservation of media plurality. Unlike in the German VG Media case that already dealt with digital platform undertakings and their impact on press publishers, these aspects will also need to be re-evaluated from an antitrust perspective. Against the backdrop of intensifying geopolitical tensions, strategically driven AI competition, and the fundamental importance of free media to democratic societies, this case presents a significant impetus for the development of a future-oriented regulatory framework at the nexus of media freedom, technology law, and digital competition.
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