NYT, AFP, and The Economist Join SPUR Coalition: Now 80+ Publishers Strong
The New York Times, Agence France-Presse, and The Economist have joined the SPUR coalition, which pushes AI companies to secure consent before using news content. The group now spans more than 80 publishers across 20+ countries and has launched the first standard for tracking how articles get used inside AI systems. "Intellectual property and technological progress have to exist together," said Rebecca Grossman-Cohen of The New York Times. The coalition doesn't license content on members' behalf, but it has built rules and tools for tracking usage and securing compensation. • SPUR founders (February 2025): BBC, Financial Times, The Guardian, The Telegraph, Sky News • Joined later: Associated Press, The Atlantic, ITV News, The Observer, L'Equipe, Radio France, NZZ, BDZV • Traffic losses: 2,500+ sites saw Google referral traffic drop by a third over the past year (November 2024 – November 2025)
AI-processed from TNW; edited by Hamidun News
The New York Times, Agence France-Presse, and The Economist have joined the SPUR coalition (Standards for Publisher Usage Rights) — an organization pushing AI companies to obtain consent before using news content. According to the coalition, its membership now exceeds 80 organizations across more than 20 countries.
Who's in the coalition and how it has grown
SPUR was founded in February 2025 by five British outlets: BBC, Financial Times, The Guardian, The Telegraph, and Sky News. Associated Press joined later. The current roster also includes:
- The Atlantic
- ITV News
- The Observer
- L'Equipe
- Radio France
- NZZ
- BDZV (Germany's publishers association)
- Publishers from Japan, Brazil, Argentina, and Mexico
How SPUR actually works
The coalition doesn't license content on members' behalf — each publisher negotiates its own deals with AI companies. Instead, SPUR builds shared rules and technical tools that let publishers track how neural networks use their content and demand compensation for it.
This month, the organization rolled out its first standard: a methodology for logging every instance where an AI system pulls up an article, uses it in a response, quotes it, or surfaces it to users. Those logs get sent back to the publishers.
"We can't just hope for the best when it comes to AI companies and the future of journalism," said David Buttle, SPUR co-founder.
A legal war and a political fight
The coalition is forming against the backdrop of a sharp conflict between publishers and AI companies. The New York Times is suing OpenAI and Microsoft for copyright infringement. USA Today and several of its sister papers filed suit against OpenAI earlier this month. Around 300 publishers have petitioned U.S. lawmakers to ban stealth AI bots that scrape their sites.
But there's pushback too: the U.S. Department of Justice has sided with OpenAI in one legal proceeding, arguing that training AI on publishers' content can qualify as fair use.
How AI is draining news traffic
Publishers are losing visitors through search engines that now serve AI-generated answers instead of links. A Reuters Institute study found that more than 2,500 sites saw their Google traffic drop by a third worldwide between November 2024 and November 2025. Users get their answers straight in the search results, bypassing the original sources entirely.
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Key Questions Answered
Who's in the coalition and how it has grown?
SPUR was founded in February 2025 by five British outlets: BBC, Financial Times, The Guardian, The Telegraph, and Sky News. Associated Press joined later. The current roster also includes: The Atlantic ITV News The Observer L'Equipe Radio France NZZ BDZV (Germany's publishers association) Publishers from Japan, Brazil, Argentina, and Mexico
How SPUR actually works?
The coalition doesn't license content on members' behalf — each publisher negotiates its own deals with AI companies. Instead, SPUR builds shared rules and technical tools that let publishers track how neural networks use their content and demand compensation for it. This month, the organization rolled out its first standard: a methodology for logging every instance where an AI system pulls up an article, uses it in a response, quotes it, or surfaces it to users. Those logs get sent back to the publishers. "We can't just hope for the best when it comes to AI companies and t
What are the key details on A legal war and a political fight?
The coalition is forming against the backdrop of a sharp conflict between publishers and AI companies. The New York Times is suing OpenAI and Microsoft for copyright infringement. USA Today and several of its sister papers filed suit against OpenAI earlier this month. Around 300 publishers have petitioned U.S. lawmakers to ban stealth AI bots that scrape their sites. But there's pushback too: the U.S. Department of Justice has sided with OpenAI in one legal proceeding, arguing that training AI on publishers' content can qualify as fair use.
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