What is behind the deal between News Corp and Meta
News Corp, the media conglomerate founded by Rupert Murdoch that controls heavyweight outlets like the Wall Street Journal, the New York Post, The Times of London, and financial information service Dow Jones, has struck a content licensing deal with Meta that could be worth up to $50 million per year. With an expected duration of at least three years, the total value could reach $150 million. The goal is pretty straightforward: to allow Meta to use journalistic content produced by the conglomerate in the United States and the United Kingdom to train its Artificial Intelligence models. In practice, news stories, analyses, breaking reports, and all kinds of editorial material are now treated as a strategic asset — something that can be negotiated and monetized directly with big tech companies.
The deal was reported by the Wall Street Journal itself, which belongs to News Corp, and includes content from the Journal and the New York Post. It is worth noting, however, that the group’s Australian outlets — such as the Daily Telegraph and the Herald Sun — are not part of this contract. That distinction matters because News Corp in Australia has taken a far more combative stance against technology platforms, with its executive chairman Michael Miller going so far as to call on media outlets to present a united front against platforms and AI companies that seek content without paying for it.
What drew the most attention, though, was a statement from News Corp’s global CEO, Robert Thomson, during a Morgan Stanley technology conference held in San Francisco. Thomson compared journalism to semiconductors, data centers, and energy — inputs that underpin the entire infrastructure of the digital age. He called News Corp an input company, meaning a supplier of essential raw material for the operation of Artificial Intelligence systems. It is a powerful analogy that completely reshapes the narrative around the role of media in this new technological landscape.
Rather than positioning journalism as a victim of technology, Thomson is saying that without reliable, high-quality content, AI models simply do not work properly. And honestly, that makes a lot of sense when you look at how these systems are trained. Breaking news, exclusive real estate market information, and in-depth financial analysis are exactly the kind of data that separates a good language model from a mediocre one.
Thomson’s strategy: woo or sue
Robert Thomson made it clear during the conference that his approach to technology companies follows a well-defined logic, which he himself summed up as woo or sue. The idea is simple: if an AI company wants to use News Corp content, there is the door of negotiation. But if it decides to take that content without permission, it will face the door of the courtroom.
This stance is not just talk. News Corp has already shown in practice that it is willing to go down both paths. On one hand, the company signed a five-year deal with OpenAI in 2024, valued at $250 million, which brought content from the Wall Street Journal, the New York Post, The Times, and The Sunday Times to the Artificial Intelligence platform behind ChatGPT. On the other hand, the group has publicly positioned itself against the unauthorized use of journalistic material by generative AI systems.
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Thomson also revealed that he maintains a close relationship with the top leaders of the technology companies involved. According to him, conversations with Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, are frequent, as are text exchanges with Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Meta, which happen over WhatsApp. This kind of personal proximity between media and tech executives is a sign that negotiations are becoming increasingly sophisticated and that the game has moved beyond lawsuits into long-term strategic partnerships.
This dynamic of direct negotiation stands in stark contrast to the approach taken by other outlets. The New York Times, for example, chose a completely different path by suing OpenAI and Microsoft — the startup’s main investor — over the use of its content in training generative AI models and large language model systems. These are two distinct strategies for the same problem, and the market is watching closely to see which one proves more effective in the long run.
Journalism as raw material in the age of Artificial Intelligence
The idea that journalism functions as an input for Artificial Intelligence is not exactly new, but it had never been articulated so explicitly by an executive of Robert Thomson’s stature. When you think about the large language models that power tools like AI assistants from Meta, Google, or OpenAI, it becomes clear that they depend on massive volumes of high-quality text to generate reliable and relevant responses. Breaking news, investigative reporting, economic analysis, and factual coverage are exactly the type of content that gives these models precision and credibility.
Without this material, the systems tend to generate generic, outdated, or simply wrong information — the notorious problem of AI hallucinations. Thomson reinforced this point by stating that the reliable content produced by publications like The Australian, The Times of London, and Dow Jones is hard to beat as an input for Artificial Intelligence systems. And he went even further by saying that in the AI era, the real threat falls on so-called output companies — businesses that depend on generating results from data — and not on the companies that supply the data itself.
This shift in perspective is significant because it puts professional journalism in a position of strength, not vulnerability. If AI models need reliable content to work, and if that content is produced by newsrooms with decades of experience and established reputation, then there is an asymmetry of value that can be exploited commercially. The deal with Meta, combined with the earlier contract with OpenAI, suggests that News Corp is building an entirely new revenue model based on this logic.
The impact on the media ecosystem and the ripple effect
The deal between News Corp and Meta also raises an important question about the valuation of journalistic content. For a long time, stories and news were consumed for free — or nearly for free — by platforms that aggregated headlines and excerpts without adequately compensating the original outlets. Now, with content licensing becoming a viable business model, there is a real possibility that journalism will start being priced more fairly.
When a company the size of News Corp closes a deal of this magnitude, other media conglomerates gain a benchmark for negotiation. Smaller outlets also gain arguments to demand compensation for the use of their materials in AI training. This could create a more balanced ecosystem where journalism is no longer just exploited but recognized as a fundamental piece in the Artificial Intelligence value chain.
A good example that illustrates this trend is Guardian Media Group, which signed a strategic partnership with OpenAI in February 2025. Although the financial terms of that deal were not detailed in the same way, the fact that more outlets are sitting down at the table to negotiate points to a market trend that is likely to strengthen in the coming years.
Thomson said he sees the opportunities AI offers to news organizations as greater than the risks. That optimistic outlook, coming from someone who leads one of the largest media groups on the planet, carries considerable weight. But it does not mean the challenges have disappeared. The integration of Artificial Intelligence into search engines, as Google has been doing, continues to reduce the number of people who click on links to news websites. This directly impacts the advertising revenue of newsrooms and threatens the sustainability of professional journalism, especially for smaller outlets that lack the bargaining power to close multimillion-dollar deals.
News Corp is also betting on AI internally
In addition to licensing content to third parties, News Corp has also been investing in the use of Artificial Intelligence within its own journalistic operations. The group’s Australian division developed and implemented an internal tool called NewsGPT, which uses AI to assist with editorial work. The initiative, however, was not received without reservations. Some of the company’s journalists expressed concerns about how the tool could affect the creative process, editorial quality, and even job security in newsrooms.
This kind of internal tension is common in organizations that are at the forefront of adopting new technologies. On one hand, AI tools can automate repetitive tasks, speed up data analysis, and allow journalists to focus on higher-value work. On the other hand, there is a legitimate concern that excessive automation could compromise editorial identity and the depth of reporting. Striking the balance between technological efficiency and journalistic quality is one of the biggest challenges the media industry will need to face in the years ahead.
The bigger picture: billions in AI infrastructure investment
The licensing deal with News Corp is just one piece of a much larger puzzle that Meta is putting together. Zuckerberg’s company has made multibillion-dollar investments in Artificial Intelligence infrastructure over the past year. One of the most notable moves was a contract worth up to $6 billion with Corning, the manufacturer of advanced materials for telecommunications and electronics, to supply fiber optic cables for Meta’s data centers. These data centers are the backbone of the company’s AI models, and ensuring they have the necessary physical infrastructure is just as important as ensuring they have quality data for training.
This context helps explain why Meta is willing to pay significant amounts for News Corp content. When you invest billions in hardware and infrastructure, spending tens of millions on high-quality journalistic content to feed your models becomes a logical and even economical decision. The quality of input data is one of the factors that most influences the quality of responses generated by language models, and verified, up-to-date journalistic content is one of the most valuable types of data in this context.
What changes in the relationship between media and big tech
Historically, the relationship between media companies and tech giants has been marked by mistrust and legal battles. News Corp, particularly in Australia, was one of the most vocal critics in this debate, with the executive chairman of its Australian division calling social media platforms monsters that torment children. That history makes the deal with Meta even more symbolic, because it shows that it is possible to move from direct confrontation to a structured commercial relationship, at least in certain markets and contexts.
This does not mean the problems are over or that all the ethical questions have been resolved. But it does indicate that the market is maturing and that both technology and media companies are starting to understand that collaboration can be more productive than all-out war. On Meta’s side, the deal also reveals a shift in stance. The company knows that the quality of training data is a massive competitive advantage. Securing legal and structured access to top-tier journalistic content reduces regulatory risks, improves model quality, and strengthens the company’s image at a time when global pressure for AI regulation is only growing.
For Meta, paying $50 million a year for News Corp content could be a strategic investment that pays for itself many times over, especially if it helps avoid billion-dollar lawsuits down the road and keeps its AI products competitive against rivals like Google and OpenAI. The scenario emerging from this deal points to a new dynamic between journalism and technology, where editorial content is no longer a free resource and instead carries a clear market price.
This could benefit not only large conglomerates like News Corp but the entire journalism production chain, including regional news agencies and independent outlets that produce original, relevant content. Of course, there are still plenty of challenges ahead — questions about transparency in data usage, copyrights on derivative content, and the very definition of fair value for different types of journalistic material. But the fact that one of the world’s largest media companies and one of the world’s largest technology companies were able to sit down and close a deal of this scale is, in itself, a sign that the conversation has changed its tone. And for the better 🚀
