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Judge rejects most ChatGPT copyright claims from book authors

arstechnica.com

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Re: Judge rejects most ChatGPT copyright claims from book authors

#81

Post by [deleted] »

zilti wrote: post #69
stale2002 wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Otherwise WTF have we been prosecuting individuals for all these years for pirating movies and music etc? We don't. Nobody got prosecuted for downloading movies. Because that isn't illegal. Whats illegal is distributing copies to other people. Its OK though. Its a common misconception that internet piracy is illegal. Only the distribution part has ever been successfully prosecuted. > They didn’t do that. They used…

Of course it is illegal in many countries to download pirated movies. And the USA put a lot of pressure on countries where it isn't illegal - I know that well enough, in my country it was and is legal.

[deleted]

Re: Judge rejects most ChatGPT copyright claims from book authors

#82

Post by [deleted] »

tailspin2019 wrote: post #42
stale2002 wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Otherwise WTF have we been prosecuting individuals for all these years for pirating movies and music etc? We don't. Nobody got prosecuted for downloading movies. Because that isn't illegal. Whats illegal is distributing copies to other people. Its OK though. Its a common misconception that internet piracy is illegal. Only the distribution part has ever been successfully prosecuted. > They didn’t do that. They used…

It’s not just distribution. Making unauthorised reproductions of copyrighted work is also copyright infringement. I take your point that prosecutions are focused more on the sharers than individual downloaders, but OpenAI still infringed copyright by making unauthorised reproductions of the authors’ works (by downloading pirated copies of them).

[deleted]

Re: Judge rejects most ChatGPT copyright claims from book authors

#83

Post by stale2002 »

tailspin2019 wrote: post #42
stale2002 wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Otherwise WTF have we been prosecuting individuals for all these years for pirating movies and music etc? We don't. Nobody got prosecuted for downloading movies. Because that isn't illegal. Whats illegal is distributing copies to other people. Its OK though. Its a common misconception that internet piracy is illegal. Only the distribution part has ever been successfully prosecuted. > They didn’t do that. They used…

It’s not just distribution. Making unauthorised reproductions of copyrighted work is also copyright infringement. I take your point that prosecutions are focused more on the sharers than individual downloaders, but OpenAI still infringed copyright by making unauthorised reproductions of the authors’ works (by downloading pirated copies of them).

> but OpenAI still infringed copyright by making unauthorised reproductions of the authors’ works (by downloading pirated copies of them).

I am not aware of a single example in the history of US copyright law where someone has been successfully prosecuted for the downloading part.

If such an example does not exist, then I think it is safe to say that it is not illegal.

But feel free to show me this an example. Because I have so far never heard of such a case.

Re: Judge rejects most ChatGPT copyright claims from book authors

#84

Post by PeterisP »

stale2002 wrote: post #80
PeterisP wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're conflating different matters here by merging together "legal/illegal" and "successfully prosecuted" - in general, there is a big gap of things prohibited by law which can't and won't ever be prosecuted by the state as they aren't felonies or misdemeanors, but only justify civil claims of compensation, if the other party wants to sue them and cares to put in the effort (and money) to actually do so. I think it'…

> You're conflating different matters here by merging together "legal/illegal" and "successfully prosecuted" There isn't any difference between these two things. If something has never and will never be enforced then it is just words on a piece of paper. The only way that words on a piece of paper turn into something that actually matters is through enforcement. So the point stands. It doesn't matter what your interp…

"not prosecuted" doesn't mean "not enforced", it means "not enforced by state". Companies can successfully enforce copyright infringement and sometimes do so - there's a world of difference "if I don't attract too much attention, it's very unlikely they'll come after me" and "what I'm doing is legal".

Re: Judge rejects most ChatGPT copyright claims from book authors

#85

Post by sebzim4500 »

nhinck2 wrote: post #64
pfdietz wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What if I merely demonstrate knowledge that means I've memorized the book? For example, being able to answer yes/no questions about what's on a particular page? The point I'm trying to make here is that in this situation I have a representation of the entire book in my brain. Haven't I copied it into my neurons?

Do you profit from people testing your ability to memorise the book and give them the ability to substantially recreate the original work and act in competition to the original author?

Do LLM providers?

Re: Judge rejects most ChatGPT copyright claims from book authors

#86

Post by snickerbockers »

naskwo wrote: post #56

How is this different from the authors of (business book) seeking royalties from (bigtech CEO) because he/she ingested knowledge (training) from this book? Humankind needs to build on top of each other’s knowledge to keep evolving.

Well the biggest difference is that we're not talking about people in this case. We can actually just discriminate against computer programs, they have no rights and they don't even have the agency to act on their own behalf. They're just tools.

>Humankind needs to build on top of each other’s knowledge to keep evolving.

I agree, but that's never stopped copyright law in the past. What's frustrating is that copyright law is suddenly up for debate now that the copyrights in question predominantly belong to individuals rather than large corporations, an what's really frustrating is that it seems they want to carve out an exemption for this one specific case instead of reforming copyright law.

Re: Judge rejects most ChatGPT copyright claims from book authors

#88

Post by snickerbockers »

wilg wrote: post #36
maronato wrote: post #34

I think the real issue here is that we’re trying to apply laws made by humans for humans to something entirely new and not well understood: LLMs. This won’t be something we’ll cleanly solve using current regulation.

I agree, but of course national legislation is like impossible now due to a certain obstructionist political party.

[assuming you mean America] as long as there're only two parties they're both equally obstructionist.

Re: Judge rejects most ChatGPT copyright claims from book authors

#89

Post by snickerbockers »

maronato wrote: post #34

I think the real issue here is that we’re trying to apply laws made by humans for humans to something entirely new and not well understood: LLMs. This won’t be something we’ll cleanly solve using current regulation.

I don't see any reason why LLMs need their own laws, fundamentally it's just another computer program.

Re: Judge rejects most ChatGPT copyright claims from book authors

#90

Post by glimshe »

zx8080 wrote: post #38
siliconc0w wrote: post #21

Though I think that training data is totally a violation of copyright, OpenAI really needs to win. Copyright has been unreasonably extended to the point where it's untenable and if we needed to track down rights holders and negotiate 'training rights' we'd ensure there would be no open models or competition going forward. The rights holders are going to lose this one and it's probably for the better.

> Though I think that training data is totally a violation of copyright, OpenAI really needs to win. It will have 2 consequences: 1. No reliable law. 2. No win for humans. Only big corps (openai and corporations behind it) wins. Is it really what we all deserve?

These ChatGPT monthly subscriptions are paid by humans who benefit from the technology.
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