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John Carmack about open source and anti-AI activists

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Re: John Carmack about open source and anti-AI activists

#471

Post by notepad0x90 »

Let's say I put out a bag of candies for halloween or something for anyone to come and take without restrictions. A few of them take most of the candies, then go around the corner and sell it for a significant profit, so much that they are billionaires now, but I've only grown poorer.

Would I have any right to be pissed off? No. Once I shared the candies, I have surrendered all entitlements over them.

Furthermore, let's say I put some legal text on the candy wrapper that said "if you get sick from eating it, i'm not responsible. if you sell it, you have to pay me 10%. If you cook something with the candy and resell that product, you have to share your new recipe with the world." and a bunch of other ridiculous things. But I put it out there for anyone to take, reading the wrapper and accepting the terms was not a condition the public needed to meet before being able to obtain the candy. Not only that, if you put out poisonous food for the public, what you put on the wrapper doesn't absolve you from responsiblity. Being able to offer things for free to others doesn't grant you rights to control their future commercial activity, unless they specifically agreed to that. It is also outlandish and ridiculous to claim you can have a say in someone's recipe's confidentiality simply because they modified your ingredient candy before using it as part of their recipe.

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Re: John Carmack about open source and anti-AI activists

#472

Post by abenga »

casey2 wrote: post #458
socalgal2 wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It not a completely one sided relationship. I'm using google maps for free!!! That's HUGE benefit to me. That google makes money from it is irrelevant to me. They're paying me by providing a free service that I get tons of usage out all the time.

>I'm using google maps for free!!! That's HUGE benefit to me. Is it? You are doing labor (usage) that harms yourself (brain damage). The fact that google makes money isn't irrelevant, it's the whole point.

Why would using Google maps cause brain damage?

Re: John Carmack about open source and anti-AI activists

#473

Post by bushbaba »

Aurornis wrote: post #258
crote wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I received a barrage of comments about working for free for a corporation that's making money off me The problem is that the big tech companies aren't holding up their end of the traditional social contract. I like to think of the wider open source community as one giant group project. Everyone contributes what they can, and in turn they can benefit from the work everyone else has done. The work you do goes towards…

> The problem is that the big tech companies aren't holding up their end of the traditional social contract. This analogy feels too strained. Google gives away Maps, Gmail, and other products for free. A little UI widget inviting users to submit fixes is hardly an onerous demand. > and they will of course log your location history and sell it to the highest bidder. Google does not do this, no matter how many times th…

Google does do this. I saw it first hand while employed by Google. They sell your location data.

Yes it’s not in the raw but it is sold as part of targeted ads

Re: John Carmack about open source and anti-AI activists

#474

Post by shdh »

wiseowise wrote: post #436
shdh wrote: post #386

Earlier quoted context omitted.

id Software released the source code to Wolfenstein in 1995, he was only rich at that point on merit and the success of their games. Bethesda ended that practice.

What's your point though? That just because he's extremely smart, got lucky and got rich in the process he's somehow immune to critique? No one can argue that John is an exceptional programmer and human being, but millions of developers aren't Carmacks – they're shmucks trying to survive under increasing pressure of corporate boot squeezing ever more. They're the ones being threatened by AI, not wealthy John for whom…

Being displaced due to improved technology isn't anything new.

Wagons pulled by horses used to be driven by people as well.

Re: John Carmack about open source and anti-AI activists

#475

Post by tpoacher »

esperent wrote: post #430
sph wrote: post #424

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never found the idea of a thinking computer exciting, just as I don’t find the idea of a thinking screwdriver exciting. These days I see the ultimate goal to create a super-intelligence to be blasphemous, if not existentially dangerous and I am afraid by how nonchalant everybody is about it. I quite enjoy a reality where humans and biological life are in control of their destiny, but it’s apparently become a taboo…

Good for you. But other people are allowed to find things exciting that you don't. Personally I'd find the idea of thinking screwdriver... Well, weird. But definitely amazing and exciting.

A thinking screwdriver:

"You know what ... screw this."

Re: John Carmack about open source and anti-AI activists

#476

Post by waffletower »

rurp wrote: post #208
arjie wrote: post #108

Has anyone else noticed a cultural shift around monetization of output? I think there wasn't as much back when I first started using open-source programs, both as a user, and a small-time contributor for decades now. And I've noticed this on other things too. A short while ago, someone on Reddit pointed out that something on Google Maps was wrong and so I went and submitted a fix and told them how to and I received a…

I've never publicly scolded someone for doing free work for tech monopolies but I do understand the impulse. The problem is that it's a completely one-sided relationship, and there are perfectly legitimate concerns about how the biggest tech companies are using their wealth and power. At this point I doubt much of anyone would expect a large tech company to go out of its way to lose money in order to support human co…

You can't demonize Google, in binary fashion, and remain intellectually honest. Economically the big tech relationship is clearly one-sided, but that ignores what the tech companies are actually providing. If we didn't find a need for their products, they wouldn't be streaming billions in revenue. Even before 2017, while deservedly subject to global anti-trust suits, they provided arguably the best and most popular search tool which empowered and connected its literal billions of users. In 2017 Google researchers published "Attention is all you need" for all eyes to read -- without a software patent. This came after a long trajectory of AI investment. This seminal work, more than any other single advance, birthed modern AI, an undeniably powerful and disruptive technology which is largely supplanting Google's search products. While I am supportive of big tech giving back in the form of higher taxation upon their profits, you can't deny the arguably insane research gifts they have bestowed upon all. But you still certainly can ask the question, "is this technology making the world a better place?" as you have suggested.

Re: John Carmack about open source and anti-AI activists

#477

Post by bluefirebrand »

jamesnorden wrote: post #457
bluefirebrand wrote: post #353

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not free. The cost is the information about where you are and what you're looking for basically at all time.

I hate when my navigation app knows where I am!

Sure, your navigation app needs to know where you are in order to function

Does the company that owns your navigation app have to remember every route you've ever taken forever? Does it need to do meta analysis on your location data to figure out where you likely work and life and where your friend are? Does it need to sell that data to law enforcement and businesses so they can track your movements and pattern match your behaviors?

Seems to me there's a huge gulf between "location app knows where you are" and "we have used that to collect every scrap of information about your movements everywhere you go and weaponized that information against you"

Re: John Carmack about open source and anti-AI activists

#478

Post by jasomill »

raincole wrote: post #275
arjie wrote: post #108

Has anyone else noticed a cultural shift around monetization of output? I think there wasn't as much back when I first started using open-source programs, both as a user, and a small-time contributor for decades now. And I've noticed this on other things too. A short while ago, someone on Reddit pointed out that something on Google Maps was wrong and so I went and submitted a fix and told them how to and I received a…

> someone on Reddit pointed out that something on Google Maps was wrong and so I went and submitted a fix and told them how to and I received a barrage of comments about working for free for a corporation that's making money off me This tells you about Reddit's demographic and nothing else. Remember Reddit has a dedicated sub for antiwork. It used to have a sub for shoplifting (I'm not kidding.)

Reddit is…Reddit.

Here's a fan sub for a nonexistent video game with 85,000 members:

https://reddit.com/r/DCAllies/

Say what you will about shoplifting, at least it's a physically realizable activity.

Re: John Carmack about open source and anti-AI activists

#479

Post by tonyedgecombe »

verisimi wrote: post #450
bcrosby95 wrote: post #313

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Avoiding every corporation that does stuff you disagree with just isn't feasible. All we can do is weigh their business model and other practices with the value we get out of it. People on Reddit who also have a problem with Reddit are obviously on Reddit. That is tautological. It doesn't mean they aren't avoiding other companies for similar reasons, which wouldn't make them a hypocrite either.

> Avoiding every corporation that does stuff you disagree with just isn't feasible. That would be all of them. They are all dirty. The idea of 'voting with your dollar' is ridiculous - they are all terrible, so there's nothing to vote for. But yes, modern life requires that we engage with their nonsense, no need to think of the interaction as anything more that begrudging extraction.

I don’t know. I’m more wary of a company that makes its money from advertising than one that profits on the goods it sells me.

Re: John Carmack about open source and anti-AI activists

#480

Post by tonyedgecombe »

waffletower wrote: post #476
rurp wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've never publicly scolded someone for doing free work for tech monopolies but I do understand the impulse. The problem is that it's a completely one-sided relationship, and there are perfectly legitimate concerns about how the biggest tech companies are using their wealth and power. At this point I doubt much of anyone would expect a large tech company to go out of its way to lose money in order to support human co…

You can't demonize Google, in binary fashion, and remain intellectually honest. Economically the big tech relationship is clearly one-sided, but that ignores what the tech companies are actually providing. If we didn't find a need for their products, they wouldn't be streaming billions in revenue. Even before 2017, while deservedly subject to global anti-trust suits, they provided arguably the best and most popular s…

They have been selling our attention, that is worth demonisation.
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