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submitted 2 years ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

I've generally been against giving AI works copyright, but this article presented what I felt were compelling arguments for why I might be wrong. What do you think?

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[-] [email protected] 22 points 2 years ago

The strongest argument against AI art is that it is derivative of the copyrighted art it is based on. A photo of a copyrighted artwork would be similarly difficult to copyright. In this sense, AI art is more akin to music sampling in that it uses original material to make something new -- and to sample music you must ask permission.

[-] [email protected] 8 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

You can't copyright AI-generated art even if it was only trained with images in the public domain.

In fact, you can't copyright AI-generated art even it was only trained with images that you made.

[-] [email protected] 2 points 2 years ago

I think this nails it. It's probably the attack authors will use against OpenAI.

But the copyright office clearly states otherwise, so we're in for a showdown.

Personally, I think the AI stuff seems more akin to writing a book in the style of another author, which is completely legal. And, to be clear, my option has no legal effect here whatsoever. 😅

[-] [email protected] 7 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

There are two separate issues here. First, can you copyright art that is completely AI-generated? The answer is no. So openAI cannot claim a copyright for its output, no matter how it was trained.

The other issue is if openAI violated a copyright. It's true that if you write a book in the style of another author, then you aren't violating copyright. And the same is true of openAI.

But that's not really what the openAI lawsuit alleges. The issue is not what it produces today, but how it was originally trained. The authors point out that in the process of training openAI, the developers illegally download their works. You can't illegally download copyrighted material, period. It doesn't matter what you do with it afterwards. And AI developers don't get a free pass.

Illegally downloading copyrighted books for pleasure reading is illegal. Illegally downloading copyrighted books for training an AI is equally illegal.

[-] [email protected] 1 points 2 years ago

I'm happy with the illegal downloading being illegal. Where things get murky for me is what algorithms you're allowed to use on the data.

I get the impression that if they'd bought all the books legally that the lawsuit would still be happening.

[-] [email protected] 2 points 2 years ago

If they bought physical books then the lawsuit might happen, but it would be much harder to win.

If they bought e-books, then it might not have helped the AI developers. When you buy an e-book you are just buying a license, and the license might restrict what you can do with the text. If an e-book license prohibits AI training (and they will in the future, if they don't already) then buying the e-book makes no difference.

Anyway, I expect that in the future publishers will make sets of curated data available for AI developers who are willing to pay. Authors who want to participate will get royalties, and developers will have a clear license to use the data they paid for.

[-] [email protected] 2 points 2 years ago
[-] [email protected] 4 points 2 years ago

Is that a picture of a straw man?

[-] [email protected] 2 points 2 years ago

It's characters from a popular TV show as knitted figures.

[-] [email protected] 2 points 2 years ago

I bet you could build a machine that could recognize subject matter from photographs of it more feasibly than you could build a machine that recognized training data from output

this post was submitted on 22 Sep 2023
85 points (95.7% liked)

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