Publishers expand SPUR coalition to curb unpaid AI content use

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Publishers expand SPUR coalition

Highlights

SPUR coalition has expanded to over 80 members in 20+ countries, now including The Atlantic and Brazil's National Association of Newspapers.
SPUR launched the Content Telemetry Standard to standardize AI content usage reporting and facilitate licensing, aiming to ensure compensation for media creators.
Google organic-search referrals to 2,500+ websites declined 33% globally from November 2024 to November 2025 due to AI-generated search answers.

Coalition growth and standards push

As reported by Reuters, the Standards for Publisher Usage Rights, or SPUR, was launched in February and is aimed at preventing AI companies from using or profiting from publishers' content without permission. The coalition now includes more than 80 members in over 20 countries, with new additions also including The Atlantic and Brazil's National Association of Newspapers alongside founding members such as the Financial Times, BBC and Associated Press.

SPUR, which is funded entirely by its members, is developing industry-wide standards and technical systems to help publishers track and control how AI companies use their content and to facilitate licensing agreements. The group recently introduced its Content Telemetry Standard, designed to standardize how AI agents record and report their use of media content as part of efforts to ensure creators are compensated for their work.

"Intellectual property protection and technological advancement can and must co-exist," Rebecca Grossman-Cohen, the New York Times' head of strategic partnerships and chief of staff, said in a statement.

Legal and traffic pressures on publishers

Media groups are also stepping up legal efforts against AI developers over the use of editorial content to train large language models. Earlier this month, USA Today and several newspapers it owns sued OpenAI, alleging copyright infringement, while OpenAI and its backer Microsoft also face similar claims from authors and news organizations, including The New York Times.

At the same time, publishers are grappling with weaker referral traffic as search engines introduce AI-generated answers that let users consume information without clicking through to news websites. Google organic-search referrals to more than 2,500 websites fell 33% globally between November 2024 and November 2025, according to a Reuters Institute report citing data from Chartbeat.

Our earlier article on Australia’s debate over AI market power and inequality examined concerns that, even if AI narrows wage gaps inside workplaces, overall income inequality could still rise if a small group of AI owners captures most of the gains. It also highlighted the push for guardrails and unresolved copyright reforms tied to AI training, focusing on who controls AI systems and how benefits are shared across the economy.

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