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On being listed as an artist whose work was used to train Midjourney

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Re: On being listed as an artist whose work was used to train Midjourney

#291

Post by cmiles74 »

mondrian wrote: post #197
sandworm101 wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> If you think OpenAI is less valuable because it can't use copyrighted content, then it should give some of that value back to the content. But we are allowed to use copyrighted content. We are not allowed to copy copyrighted content. We are allowed to view and consume it, to be influenced by it, and under many circumstances even outright copy it. If one doesn't want anyone to see/consume or be influenced by one's…

Does copyright law say you can ingest copyrighted work at very large scale and sell derivates of those works to gain massive profit / massive market capitalizations? Honestly wondering. This seems to be the crux issue here.

Yes, I believe that is correct. If you do something "transformative" with the material then you are allowed to treat it as something new. There's also the idea of using a portion of a copyrighted work (like a quote or a clip of a song or video), this would be "fair use".

Re: On being listed as an artist whose work was used to train Midjourney

#292

Post by sandworm101 »

cmiles74 wrote: post #254
sandworm101 wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> If you think OpenAI is less valuable because it can't use copyrighted content, then it should give some of that value back to the content. But we are allowed to use copyrighted content. We are not allowed to copy copyrighted content. We are allowed to view and consume it, to be influenced by it, and under many circumstances even outright copy it. If one doesn't want anyone to see/consume or be influenced by one's…

The artist in the article clearly states that his work was free to use only if it was not used to make a profit, those were the terms of their license. In the artist's opinion, OpenAI violated that license by training their tool on their work and then selling that tool. This artist doesn't complain about work similar to their own being generated, and their artwork is very clearly not clothing.

>> In the artist's opinion, OpenAI violated that license...

So? Why does the author's opinion even enter into the equation? Authors cannot claim ownership beyond the bounds of copyright. If what AI is doing qualifies as fair use, the artist cannot do anything about it. I'm sure that lots of artists would not want anyone to lampoon or criticize their work. They cannot stop such things. I'm sure lots of artists would never want anyone to ever create anything in any way similar to their work. They cannot do that either.

Re: On being listed as an artist whose work was used to train Midjourney

#293

Post by arnaudsm »

nmz wrote: post #234

With that whole harvard plagiarism debacle, I must say this is the new normal, copyright and accreditation is a thing of the past. The only way forward is plagiarism and outsourcing your work, the only ones who will make the money will be the ones who offer the quickest way of offering the work, no matter its quality. A world for AI to AI. As morals erodes, 20 years from now, there will be no instagram/tik tok/facebo…

And AI is only accelerating an already existing trend. Freebooting and content farms have existed for a decade now.

I wish too that consumers will grow tired of low-quality stolen/generated content, but that is not the case yet. Take some horrific YouTube Kids content farms that are still churning billions of views for example.

Re: On being listed as an artist whose work was used to train Midjourney

#294

Post by csallen »

bluefirebrand wrote: post #256
Aeolun wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I read a lot of stories in a certain genre that I like, and I later write my own story, it’s almost by definition going to be a mish-mash of everything I like. Should I pay the authors of the books I read when I sell mine?

We shouldn't hold individual humans and ML models to the same standards, because ML models themselves are products capable of mass production and individual humans are not even remotely at the same scale. If you write that book, chances are you will gain some fans that are also fans of other authors in that genre. If ML models write that genre, they can flood that genre so full that human artists won't be able to com…

Computers and machines have been capable of mass production for decades, and humans have used them as tools. In the past 170 years, these tools of mass production have already diminished many thousands of professions that were staffed by people who had to painstakingly craft things one at a time.

Why is art some special case that should be protected, when many other industries were not?

Why should we kill this technology to protect existing artistic business models, when many other technologies were allowed to bloom despite killing other existing business models?

Nobody can really answer these questions.

Re: On being listed as an artist whose work was used to train Midjourney

#295

Post by dylan604 »

px43 wrote: post #123
spookie wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure if it applies here. Midjourney's use intends to substitute the artists' work, and is commercial.

No one is using Midjourney to replace artists. Artists are using Midjourney to speed up the most tedious parts of their work.

That's just BS. If people weren't replacing artists, there would be no need to prompt with "in the style of ___". are you honestly saying that only artistX is using the prompt "in the style of artistX"?

Re: On being listed as an artist whose work was used to train Midjourney

#296

Post by 0xcde4c3db »

ska wrote: post #228
munchler wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fair use is not copyright infringement! It’s a limitation placed on copyright to balance the interests of copyright holders with the public interest.

Of course this all depends on jurisdiction, but e.g. in the US for example fair use does not show up [oops, see note] in the limitations and exceptions in the copyright definition (like e.g. government use does), but relies on case law, the "fair use doctrine". This means quite literally it is a framework for understanding the defence of a particular use based on precedent: the defendant(s) argued it. It's a bit of a…

Maybe there's some nuance of your description that I'm missing, but fair use is codified as a limitation to copyright in US statute (although not until 1976) [1]. Application of it to any given situation is still heavily dependent on case law, though.

[1] https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/17/107

Re: On being listed as an artist whose work was used to train Midjourney

#297

Post by cooper_ganglia »

pmcp wrote: post #128
ineptech wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm always reticent to fully engage in "The Dialogue," regardless of its momentary configuration. It's a smoothie made from shibboleths; you have to be able to detect them at only a few parts per million because once these things metastasize, they stop being about whatever they were about and instead become increasingly loud recitations of various catechisms and loyalty oaths. Boy does that ring true.

Side comment: I respect the author’s right to choose words that ring well to them, but jeez, as a non native english speaker, reading this, i am happy my device has a dictionary function.

As a native English speaker, I agree!

Re: On being listed as an artist whose work was used to train Midjourney

#298

Post by s1artibartfast »

eigenket wrote: post #55
encomiast wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It applies. If only saying it would make it so. Unfortunately, it's not easy to make this legal argument given how copyright law only protects fixed, tangible expressions, not ideas, concepts, principles, etc. and has a gaping hole called 'fair use.'

The new York Times has examples where GPT will reproduce world for word exactly paragraphs of their (copyrighted) text if you ask it to. That's a pretty fixed tangible expression I think.

That is evidence that GPT Can violate copyright, not that all of the outputs do.

It supports an argument that GPT shouldnt produce outputs that are extremely similar, not that the content can not be used as an input.

Re: On being listed as an artist whose work was used to train Midjourney

#299

Post by freejazz »

wrsh07 wrote: post #175
make3 wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you decide to put your stuff on Instagram, you don't decide to put your work in midjourney

But sometimes your work is put on Instagram without your knowledge or consent (eg by an Instagram aggregator account) And this whole ecosystem of credit (or not sharing credit) is undoubtedly encouraged by Instagram (because it's valuable to me to have an Instagram account with many followers)

>But sometimes your work is put on Instagram without your knowledge or consent (eg by an Instagram aggregator account)

That's copyright infringement. You can't claim to own other people's work and then give license to others to use when you don't own the work.

Re: On being listed as an artist whose work was used to train Midjourney

#300

Post by xyproto »

gedy wrote: post #186
chrisknyfe wrote: post #88

Those of you who are desperately trying to soften the blow - "they're talking about facebook, not OpenAI", "it's fair use, the license terms are irrelevant", "nothing has been taken from them" - you need to allow yourself to think the thought that maybe your AI startup's business model is only valuable because of theft. You need to let yourself entertain the idea that maybe you are only getting paid a cushy tech sala…

Honestly digital media in general has greatly cheapened the value of images, music, illustration, etc. and this has been been a long time coming. It was clear to me over 20 years ago when I realized that I wouldn't be able to earn enough in the arts, and ironically due to creative people sharing so much good content for free. While I feel for people who didn’t realize this, but it’s no surprise if you try to earn you…

All human endeavors are dead ends, in the end.
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