Last month we reported on a lawsuit filed by self-described gamers who were trying to block Microsoft’s acquisition of Activision-Blizzard; the filing used several previously stated arguments and Section 7 of the Clayton Antitrust Act of 1914 as reasons for the deal to be stopped, and we noted at the time that the suit was likely a distraction when compared to Microsoft’s antitrust fight with the FTC.
Microsoft likely felt similarly and asked the judge hearing the gamers’ case to pause the suit while the FTC lawsuit was in process. However, the judge blocked that request, with a hearing on a preliminary injunction scheduled for Thursday, March 23rd.
In other Microsoft news, we can now perhaps safely assume where the money being saved by firing 10,000 people went: a self-described “multibillion dollar investment” in OpenAI, a tech firm more popularly known for chat AI app ChatGPT and AI art generator DALL-E. The deal is an extension of earlier investments by Microsoft in 2019 and 2021 and is intended to “responsibly advance cutting-edge AI research and democratize AI as a new technology platform” according to Microsoft chairman and CEO Satya Nadella.
Both of these AI programs are themselves causing their fair share of controversy; ChatGPT and DALL-E are causing scholastic minds to ponder the “death of art” and creative processes, while DALL-E and image generators like it are accused of stealing from artists.
