By Nitasha Tiku and Leo Sands, washingtonpost.com, 5-22-25
A federal judge in Orlando rejected an AI start-up’s argument that its chatbot’s output was protected by the First Amendment, allowing a lawsuit over the death of a Florida teen who became obsessed with the chatbot to proceed….
Judge Anne Conway ruled that the case brought in U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida can proceed. But she wrote in a court order released May 21 that she was not ready to rule on the argument that the chatbot’s messages are protected speech “at this stage,” adding that defendants Character.AI and Google had failed to articulate “why words strung together” by an AI system should be considered speech. » Read More