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Meta claims torrenting pirated books isn't illegal without proof of seeding

arstechnica.com

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Re: Meta claims torrenting pirated books isn't illegal without proof of seeding

#381

Post by johnnyanmac »

pdonis wrote: post #264
flir wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Heh. This is not the month to be making that argument. I like having food hygiene standards - it means I don't have to worry about chalk in my bread, arsenic in my sweets, or antibiotics in my beef. I honestly believe we'd be better off with informational hygiene standards, too. The last two decades have taught me this lesson - free speech absolutism is a giant "kick me" sign on the back of society, and when you find…

> I like having food hygiene standards - it means I don't have to worry about chalk in my bread, arsenic in my sweets, or antibiotics in my beef. And yet somehow humanity survived for tens or hundreds of thousands of years without such standards, and without having our ancestors' food poisoned. Also, if you actually believe that government food hygiene standards prevent all possible bad things from being in your food…

>And yet somehow humanity survived for tens or hundreds of thousands of years without such standards, and without having our ancestors' food poisoned.

Sure, with reduced life expectancy. If you're fine dying out in your 30's, maybe 40's at best you can eat whatever you want. Your body is pretty resilient to poison short term.

>, if you actually believe that government food hygiene standards prevent all possible bad things from being in your food

Extremist takes aren't doing you a favor here. Like I just said, we can resist a surprising about of poisons short term. Many people indulge in alcohol after all. We have no need to strive for "all bad things" out of our food.

Re: Meta claims torrenting pirated books isn't illegal without proof of seeding

#382

Post by dTal »

_DeadFred_ wrote: post #325
nonfamous wrote: post #279

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would expect it to be argued by defendants that since no man (or indeed woman) at Meta actually read the books that were torrented, the First Amendment does not apply here. The question is: does the First Amendment apply to an algorithm?

So I can setup a cable streaming service with ripped vids as long a no one in my company watches it?

You would be distributing the videos. Meta is not distributing the things they torrented. No, LLM weights don't count.

Re: Meta claims torrenting pirated books isn't illegal without proof of seeding

#383

Post by AnotherGoodName »

johnnyanmac wrote: post #373
icedchai wrote: post #322

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1 byte per second would give you a couple of pages every few hours. So probably not.

I byte pee second translates to a little over 3KB/hr. Depends on the book.

It's 3600 bytes/hr. 60seconds per minute and 60minutes per hour. 60*60*1byte. Not to be condescending but the math here really isn't hard.

Re: Meta claims torrenting pirated books isn't illegal without proof of seeding

#384

Post by aezart »

stalluri wrote: post #207

Models absorbed the pirated content. Now Meta is distributing those models. Is that considered distribution?

I don't know what the legal answer will be, but I believe it should be considered distribution. A model is basically a highly lossy and extremely compressed copy of its training data, available as a content-addressable database. To anthropomorphize, the model is trying to perfectly replicate its training set, its brain just isn't big enough to do so.

Re: Meta claims torrenting pirated books isn't illegal without proof of seeding

#385

Post by johnnyanmac »

AnotherGoodName wrote: post #383
johnnyanmac wrote: post #373

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I byte pee second translates to a little over 3KB/hr. Depends on the book.

It's 3600 bytes/hr. 60seconds per minute and 60minutes per hour. 60*60*1byte. Not to be condescending but the math here really isn't hard.

I mistyped a letter (thanks for indirectly pointing it out, fixed) and I get this flippant response. I guess this really is reddit.My real answer is close enough, I don't need to delineate on the level of bytes.

Either way this is oedantry. My point doesn't change; it depends on what kind of book you download.

Re: Meta claims torrenting pirated books isn't illegal without proof of seeding

#386

Post by Gormo »

papercrane wrote: post #199
sightbroke wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Amendment_to_the_United_... "Attached to the core rights of free speech and free press are several peripheral rights that make these core rights more secure. The peripheral rights encompass not only freedom of association, including privacy in one's associations, but also, in the words of Griswold v. Connecticut (1965), "the freedom of the entire university community", i.e., the ri…

The US Constitution grants congress the power to give authors and inventors time-limited exclusive rights to their works/discoveries (Art1.S8.C8). This moots the 1st amendment argument. https://constitution.congress.gov/browse/article-1/section-8...

How can a provision in the base text of the constitution take precedence over an amendment?

Re: Meta claims torrenting pirated books isn't illegal without proof of seeding

#387

Post by lucasyvas »

ThrowawayTestr wrote: post #317
lucasyvas wrote: post #151

This sets a hilarious precedent where downloading torrents becomes completely fine. You can just cite this case if they win - even though we are talking about books the MPAA is probably going to have an opinion here.

Not sure if it's still the case but this is it is in Canada. Downloading is legal but uploading is illegal.

I think you’re right but I don’t think this is the case in the US? I’ve certainly read many stories over the years of the hammer coming down on downloading on its own.

Re: Meta claims torrenting pirated books isn't illegal without proof of seeding

#388

Post by Gormo »

anonym29 wrote: post #301
tiahura wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The amendments protect the rights as they existed at the time the amendment was passed. I.e. how would the plain text of the text be interpreted by a reasonable person in 1791. E.g., re 2nd, what did militia mean? Thus, the 1A locks in speech rights as they existed in 1791. Because there was no right to slander, or threaten, or commit treason, or "share" in 1791, Congress retained the power to regulate.

>Because there was no right to slander, or threaten, or commit treason, or "share" in 1791, Congress retained the power to regulate. You seem to have a fundamental misunderstanding of the purpose and intentions of the constitution. Slander and fighting words are exceptions to the first amendment that were determined through the legislative process. Essentially the entire US constitution is negative rights - the right…

> Slander and fighting words are exceptions to the first amendment that were determined through the legislative process.

The legislative process can't make exceptions to constitutional provisions. These were recognized as not covered by first amendment protections by jurisprudence, not legislation.

Re: Meta claims torrenting pirated books isn't illegal without proof of seeding

#389

Post by bigtimesink »

escapecharacter wrote: post #166
d1sxeyes wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or, more likely, drop the case to avoid establishing a precedent. Sounds like Meta are banking on the entertainment industry looking at it and deciding that the risk of losing this case is too high given Meta’s almost infinitely deep pockets to mount a legal defence.

As much as I dislike the idea of individual copyright owners, like visual artists or writers, having their works scraped for AI without compensation… If this does break the stranglehold that copyright has over creative acts, especially in the US, this feels like a net good.

What's your test for when a use is ok and being held back by copyright law versus when it's damaging? Why is one ok but not the other?

Re: Meta claims torrenting pirated books isn't illegal without proof of seeding

#390

Post by Gormo »

nonfamous wrote: post #279
sightbroke wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Amendment_to_the_United_... "Attached to the core rights of free speech and free press are several peripheral rights that make these core rights more secure. The peripheral rights encompass not only freedom of association, including privacy in one's associations, but also, in the words of Griswold v. Connecticut (1965), "the freedom of the entire university community", i.e., the ri…

I would expect it to be argued by defendants that since no man (or indeed woman) at Meta actually read the books that were torrented, the First Amendment does not apply here. The question is: does the First Amendment apply to an algorithm?

> The question is: does the First Amendment apply to an algorithm?

No. The first amendment explicitly applies to Congress; by extension it applies to the policy-making authority of the federal government generally, and via the 14th amendment, it applies to the states.

It prohibits the abridgment of freedom of speech by government institutions, without distinction as to the identity of the speaker or the content of the speech.

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