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AI is in danger of being swallowed up by copyright law

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Re: AI is in danger of being swallowed up by copyright law

#321

Post by CBarkleyU »

RandomLensman wrote: post #270
oneeyedpigeon wrote: post #256

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But the datasets these tools are using are available to view for free. The AI isn't stealing physical books or paintings, it's viewing the same data that you or I can by sending an HTTP request, for free.

Could an AI view you for free in a street or even through a window? Does that imply it can use that view data to create advertising using your modified likeness, for example? Just because you can view something for free doesn't mean you can use it anyway you want.

> Just because you can view something or free doesn't mean you can use it anyway you want.

This whole thread really makes me want to pull my hair out.

Difference between illegaly creating a (even temporary) copy of a copyrighted work (e.g. streaming a movie) vs. creating a derivative work of said copyrighted work: Two completely different things, with completely different legal outcomes.

If OpenAI in any shape or form creates a temporary copy (The crux of this whole thing is: Human minds cannot make a copy of a copyrighted work by definition of copyright laws (in Germany, I presume the same can be said for pretty much all western copyright laws), while anything that a computer does can be construed as making a copy.

Re: AI is in danger of being swallowed up by copyright law

#322

Post by b112 »

oneeyedpigeon wrote: post #221
LtWorf wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know from which weird country you're from, but in mine profiting from it changes things a lot.

It sounds like your country is the weird one. Try burning the complete works of Disney onto stacks of DVDs, then go down to your high street and hand them out. See how long you get away with that for.

I think the big difference is distribution vs consumption. Where I live, there are additional clauses in law, for mass reproduction and selling.

But republishing any work as your own, probably falls into that category. And it isn't about profit, but commercial use; thus pasting onto a blog to improve your business (rankings, hit count) is a business use case.

Re: AI is in danger of being swallowed up by copyright law

#323

Post by flohofwoe »

That's one thing I've been asking myself a lot recently: Is it realistic to expect that AI can properly attribute the source material in its output anytime soon? IMHO this is a non-negotiable requirement if the field wants to be taken serious. How can I trust the output if I cannot verify the correctness of the input?

And then there's the legal aspect: in music, sampling is legal nowadays, but you have to ask the original author for permission and then pay royalties based on how much your own creation is based on the original sample.

AI isn't much more than automated sampling, how can AI generated content ever hope to avoid a legal quagmire if it cannot properly attribute its source material?

Re: AI is in danger of being swallowed up by copyright law

#324

Post by denton-scratch »

flawi wrote: post #289
pid-1 wrote: post #244

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Do you ask for permission when you train your mind on copyrighted books? Yes, you do need to buy books, which gives you permission to read them.

This is literally what the AI does as well. It didn't walk into a bookstore and steal all the books off the shelf, it read through material made available to it entirely legally. The thing that authors are trying to argue here is that they should get to control what type of entity should be allowed to view the work they purchased. It's the same as going "you bought my book, but now that I know you're a communist, I t…

> they should get to control what type of entity should be allowed to view the work they purchased

No, that's not it. It's more like if I memorized a bunch of pop-songs, then performed a composition of my own whose second verse was a straight lift of a song by Madonna. I would owe her performance royalties. And I would be obliged to reproduce her copyright notice, so that my audience would know that if they pull the same stunt, they're on the hook for royalties too.

Re: AI is in danger of being swallowed up by copyright law

#325

Post by wnkrshm »

oneeyedpigeon wrote: post #230
fsckboy wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

thanks for sending your strawman in to do battle with his strawman. you don't need permission to train on books, but you do need to buy the books or take them from the library one at a time. "training" these machines so far is not like human learning as becomes apparent when they spit out source code that mirrors individual repositories. And you know that humans are required to both remix their own creations and foll…

> when they spit out source code that mirrors individual repositories That's not a problem, we already have copyright laws that prevent people from distributing mirrors of copyrighted works. They don't care about how the works were copied.

It becomes a problem when violating content can be generated faster than it can be discovered and fined.

Re: AI is in danger of being swallowed up by copyright law

#326

Post by poulpy123 »

kirse wrote: post #121
jeroenhd wrote: post #105

There's no part of AI that is being swallowed up by copyright. AI companies can ask for permission if they want to train their models on other people's works. It's not that hard, various image hosting sites have already added an opt-in/opt-out toggle to their services. Sites might even get away with using this stuff as compensation for free hosting. The fact of the matter is that the AI companies don't want to ask fo…

AI companies can ask for permission if they want to train their models on other people's works Do you ask for permission when you train your mind on copyrighted books? Or observe paintings? Or listen to music? Do you ask for permission when you get new ideas from HN that aren't your own? Humans are constantly ingesting gobs of "copyrighted" insights that they eventually remix into their own creations without necessar…

But I'm a person and not a trillion dollar company. There is no reason for the rules, laws and morality have to be the same for people and companies

Re: AI is in danger of being swallowed up by copyright law

#327

Post by olalonde »

b112 wrote: post #306
_Algernon_ wrote: post #290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you pirate a book, learn from it and then create something using the information you learned, would that creation constitute copyright infringement? If so how far does the tainting go? Once you put your eyes on something which you haven't purchased, all future works could potentially be inspired by that experience and should therefore be considered infringement, following your logic.

We are not dealing with AGI here. Current trained models are basically just using copy and paste, to create "new" works. There is zero creativity, zero art, zero original thought, zero newness. When actual AGI happens, then your arguments mean something. Such as in, at least 50 or 100 years down the road.

We're not dealing with AGI but modern models absolutely demonstrate creativity and newness. If it was simple copy paste, we wouldn't be having this whole conservation since it would be simple for copyright owners to sue and win in case of infringement.

Re: AI is in danger of being swallowed up by copyright law

#328

Post by jacquesm »

kennyloginz wrote: post #263
kirse wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m not able to read billions of books in less than an hour. I think you underestimate the sheer volume of data + conclusions the brain ingests and processes on a daily basis, primarily through unconscious experience.

Not not mention the millions of years building our nervous system.

100's of millions of years.

Re: AI is in danger of being swallowed up by copyright law

#329

Post by belorn »

SxC97 wrote: post #140
YellowStuDregg wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So is market harm "Some courts have held this factor to be the most important in the analysis." https://ilt.eff.org/Copyright__Fair_Use.html#Market_Harm

I’m unclear about this. Let’s say a movie comes out and I make a YouTube review using brief clips or screenshots from the movie. Since my review is transformative, I should be in the clear (I think?). But when it comes to market harm, does the tone of my review effect the enforceability of copyright? As in, if my review is negative it would harm the market for people going to watch the movie vs a positive review righ…

Reviews have a distinct "character of use", one of the four cornerstones of fair use exceptions.

A review can be commercial, can cause significant harm to the market, can include substantial amount of the work, and yet the character of use can be significant enough to convince a judge that a exemption should be applied. Since judges historically has come to this conclusion there exist now legal precedence. With precedence we can make some general conclusions which tell us that reviews are in general exempted when using other peoples copyrighted work for the purpose of reviews.

This character of use is very different then if I convert a studio record of a song into mp3 and publish it on p2p sharing site. Judges has historically viewed the character of use in those situation as not being worth giving exemptions.

Re: AI is in danger of being swallowed up by copyright law

#330

Post by cactusplant7374 »

_Algernon_ wrote: post #312
cactusplant7374 wrote: post #303

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The AI doesn’t understand what it consumes. That is why the models still can’t add two numbers.

What's the difference between acting as if it actually understands and "true understanding". I'd argue there is none, or at least that it doesn't matter. For instance there is nothing you could do to prove to me that you aren't just a black box acting on input in a sophisticated manner (eg. chinese room argument[1]), yet I give you the benefit of the doubt. GPT's lack of understanding of math may be a localized lack…

Humans understand and there is just no comparison. Can an AI make a major novel discovery as humans have? How could they if they don’t understand language?
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