MOLLY CRANE-NEWMAN , New York Daily News via Chicago Tribune; Judge slams key OpenAI witness in copyright infringement case for ‘hazy recollections’
"An unimpressed Manhattan judge ordered a corporate representative for OpenAI to undergo a second deposition after finding he failed to answer “even the simplest questions” the first time around about what the company has described as efforts to limit chatbots from stealing writers’ work.
Magistrate Judge Ona Wang, in a sharply-worded 11-page order Tuesday, said OpenAI had been put on notice that the company’s purported expert on plagiarism John Vincent “Vinnie” Monaco was woefully underprepared for his January deposition, ordering him to submit to 3.5 more hours of questioning that took place Wednesday.
In granting a motion from the Chicago Tribune, New York Times and other news outlets suing OpenAI to compel the additional testimony, Wang deferred ruling on a request for sanctions, saying it would depend on how Monaco fared in his do-over. She said she may issue fines or recommend some of his answers be deemed as admissions.
OpenAI has previously said that Monaco has more knowledge than any of its engineers about Project Giraffe, an internal operation which the company claims is designed to develop ways to limit its learning language models, or LLMs, from inadvertently regurgitating copyrighted works — the issue at the core of the ongoing Manhattan Federal Court lawsuit."
