This week, the tech world felt the heat from all sides: courtrooms, regulators, and content creators. In today’s Madtech Daily, we cover the projected surge in AI-driven search ad spend, Apple's failure to stall App Store shake up, and Reddit’s lawsuit against Anthropic over alleged unpaid use of training data.

Google is shelling out a USD $500 million (£393m) to overhaul its internal compliance practices, settling a shareholder lawsuit that accused senior executives including Sundar Pichai, Larry Page, and Sergey Brin of turning a blind eye to mounting antitrust risks. As part of the deal, the company will form a dedicated compliance board committee and embed cross-functional risk teams directly into product development groups. 

Apple, on the other hand, has filed a legal appeal challenging the European Commission’s recent enforcement of the Digital Markets Act (DMA), which mandates that the tech giant open its ecosystem to third-party services and competitors. 

The Europe Union refused to budge  as it gave Apple 30 days to comply with anti-steering provisions or face steeper penalties atop its existing €500m (£426m) fine. 

Meanwhile, in another landmark moment for AI and journalism, The New York Times struck  its first generative AI licensing deal, deciding to partner with  Amazon. The agreement grants Amazon access to premium content from the NYT’s core news site, NYT Cooking, and The Athletic, positioning the deal as a blueprint for how larger media organisations might thrive in the AI era rather than merely survive it.

Relatedly, AI copyright tensions are boiling over in the UK. The UK’s House of Lords has rejected the latest iteration of the Data Use and Access Bill, citing insufficient safeguards for creatives whose work may be mined by AI systems.