A prominent science writer and former blogger for The Guardian has expressed alarm over his work being syndicated by the title to OpenAI without his permission.
Press Gazette understands that Dr Dean Burnett is one of a number of freelance contributors to The Guardian who are concerned that their work was included in Guardian News and Media’s deal with OpenAI without consultation or remuneration.
The Guardian, FT, Axel Springer, Hearst and News Corp are among publishers to have signed content licensing with Open AI), while Reuters has signed a deal with Meta and DMG Media with Prorata AI – find a full list of those deals here.
Under The Guardian deal with OpenAI, announced in February 2025, the publisher said its archive and live reporting would be made available as a news source within ChatGPT in a move which the publisher said would expand its “reach and impact”. The deal involved an element of barter, with The Guardian getting access to OpenAI technology. The publisher has not disclosed whether there is also a cash element.
Freelances and news agencies whose work has been included in such deals without consultation or remuneration have expressed alarm.
Dr Dean Burnett, a neuroscientist and author whose work appeared in the Guardian, has written more than 300 articles for the Guardian, including many under the Brain Flapping science blog – including pieces which garnered millions of clicks, such as a piece from 2014 decrying the idea that Robin Williams’ suicide was selfish.
Burnett said: “The deal gives a large language model access to all the Guardian archives, a lot of which is my work.
“My most well known content is on this archive, and I do not want an AI to train it on it given a choice. My particular style, my particular output, my particular insights are how I make my living.”
Burnett says that he finds the deal more offensive than one where his content would be reused by human editors, even if he was not compensated.
He said: “I feel differently. If it was a straight replication of my work in syndication, it would still be credited to me, it would still be my work. People share my work on Facebook and Bluesky and I have my own Substack and stuff. I am aware that having my work shared with others is part of the process.”
Burnett said that when his work is republished elsewhere, he still benefits in terms of links to his books – but here, there are no benefits.
“They give it to an AI which is going to absorb it in ways which sort of reflect my work: it’s not imitation, it’s regurgitation. Someone is taking something of mine and using it for their own ends and I don’t get any compensation, recognition or acknowledgement.”
Burnett was an aspiring academic researcher, and also on the comedy scene, when he wrote a blog post for the Guardian in 2013 debunking the idea of Blue Monday, supposedly the most depressing day of the year.
He then joined the Guardian Blog Network, a group of freelance writers paid by share of advertising revenue.
Burnett said: “You just got a percentage of the ad revenue: in the first month I worked on, I think I got £73 for four pieces.
“But when the Robin Williams piece went big, I got £2500, which was great, but they said that 60% of all the hits came from smartphones. At the time, I wasn’t getting paid for smartphone clicks, so the Guardian made considerably more than they would have done if it was a fairer deal.”
Burnett contributed several pieces which were critical of other writers in the Guardian, including pieces where he challenged advice given in a book by Johann Hari, pointing out that it is dangerous to abandon antidepressants.
He said: “I became the figurehead for the pushback against Johann Hari. I think they’re quite happy because it’s sort of double the traffic for an article.”
Writers ‘disrespected’ by Guardian OpenAI deal
Burnett said he was “surprised” when the Guardian shut down the network in 2018.
“It was doing quite well, and the reason, I was told, is because someone on a different blog used a photo on the archive which wasn’t licensed for them to use and it cost several thousand pounds, and they were not going to make that back so they shut it down.”
Burnett said that he suspects that at least part of the reason was that the Guardian did not like the fact that the freelancers could contribute stuff and publish it themselves.
He said: “It was July 2018, on my birthday. That was my last post. I think it shut down a few days later. I had just left my day job. Then I lost my blog. It was bad timing, but quite a vivid memory.”
He says that the decision to allow AI to access the Guardian’s archive “disrespects” writers.
“This ignores the people who contribute the actual material you need to function as a publication, and cuts them out of the whole process. And I don’t think that’s a sustainable model either. I think that’s going to end really badly.
“If you don’t pick the writers with respect, with respect, and sort of acknowledge their work, their time, their credit, then what can you claim to be doing good journalism? Can you claim to be representing true voices? It is. It’s one thing to sort of acknowledge the reality, another to enable it to your own ends. I don’t think that’s good for the industry.”
Burnett says he has not had access to his contract with the Guardian, but suspects there may be a clause which allows them to use his work in this way.
A Guardian News & Media spokesperson said: “The Guardian’s content distribution deals form part of the revenue mix that supports our journalism. The content we license to AI businesses is treated the same way as all other agreements in terms of compensation for journalists.”
Publisher deals with AI risk widening inequality
Other freelancers have echoed Burnett’s views, with ex-BBC staffer and freelance journalist Dhruti Shah saying that AI has made an already hostile freelance landscape worse.
Shah said: “As someone whose book, which started as a visual journalism piece, and which took six years to create and features in the Atlantic stolen texts piece [the revelation Meta had stolen millions of books to train its AI model] , I will say that publishers really should think about the long term consequences when it comes to AI access. What is it actually going to be used for?
“I’m not doomladen about AI, I think it has purpose and can be used for inclusion actually. But when people are being used for ideas and resources and labour and are already barely making a profit, what we are creating are spaces of inequity and that is something that there needs to be more conversation. The industry is already an unequal one, so here’s a chance to reduce rather than widen the gap.
“It’s incredibly problematic. It’s not just about there being even less money and the writing, research and labour being devalued but also the risks. It’s certainly affecting my love of writing and also the stories I want to put out there because of the associated risks. As a freelancer, it is damaging.”
“Something original that you worked so hard on, is part of the reputation that you have built, is now fodder for the internet and they ruin the heart and soul that the human – the journalist – brings.”
News agency content syndicated to AI without credit or compensation
Ben Nicholls, owner of the Jam Press news agency says that these deals are also problematic for news agencies.
He said: “As a news agency owner, what concerns me most is that we don’t get a say in what the major publishers are agreeing with the AI giants behind closed doors.
“Around 70% of the content in newspapers comes from agencies like ours, yet if that material is later fed into AI models under a publisher’s byline, it’s a further erosion of value for those of us in the supply chain. It’s the same content we researched, wrote, sourced, and licensed, but now it’s being repurposed for someone else’s gain without consent, credit or compensation.
“We’ve seen this play out before with Google and social media. Short-term boosts for publishers, long-term damage to the journalism ecosystem. AI could be the final nail in the coffin.
“Because if agencies and freelancers fall, and news outlets continue to defund boots-on-the-ground journalism, it’s a blow to society as we know it. Who will be left to hold governments, corporations, and individuals in positions of power to account? And without reporters on the ground — agencies, freelancers, and local journalists alike — the truth becomes easier to bury and harder to find.
“The industry needs to pull together. If we don’t draw the line now, we may not get another chance.”
‘Basic fairness’ needs to be reestablished in world of AI
Deputy chief executive at the Authors Licensing and Collecting Society Richard Combes said: “I think information is a problem and transparency, because we at ALCS surveyed our members. Their chief concern was a lack of transparency in terms of, firstly how their work was being used for what purpose, also how they would be remunerated for that use. The dominant thing that we hear from members is that uncertainty.”
That problem is complex when it comes to newspaper archives, which often contain large volumes of material which have been created under a range of different commissioning agreements, contracts, rights deals, Combes explains.
He said: “I think it’s quite reasonable for individual freelancers to want to know how that works being used, and if they are going to be paid.”
In Norway, Schibsted Media Group announced an annual payment to staff (6000 kroner, £434) after it signed a deal with AI to use journalists’ work – the deal specifically excludes images and the work of freelancers, which OpenAI will not have access to.
Combes said: “The NUJ is actually at the moment running a survey of its members, just to really dig into what they can find out about current practices and how far freelance journalists are involved in the process by which these so-called strategic partnership agreements are arrived at. My overall sense, there isn’t much clarity or transparency.
“If we look at the history of this century, people are coming up with creative ways to distribute and redistribute other people’s content and making a business out of it. AI is not a non profit enterprise. These services are aimed at making money, whether it’s subscription or advertising, whatever it may ultimately be, I think where these uses happen, it’s a little bit like syndication, a sort of onward use of the work that generates value. That generates a right for the credit to share in that value. That’s sort of basic fairness principle, but it’s something we’re having to re-establish in this new world of AI.”
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