Oh please. First of all, how do you steal an idea? We’re talking about pictures. Supposing that you buy into the theory that you can, copyright was created to further the arts and sciences; it’s in the US constitution. The point isn’t to control your work — it’s to live in a richer society. And it’s not even clear that training a model counts as infringement. Being able to recite a quote from a book is different than reproducing the entire book. Artists won’t acknowledge that the same applies to their art.
If you believe that training models on art is stealing, then I’m a master ninja, since I’m the creator of books3. And even Stephen King today came out and said that he’s fine with it:
> Would I forbid the teaching (if that is the word) of my stories to computers? Not even if I could. I might as well be King Canute, forbidding the tide to come in. Or a Luddite trying to stop industrial progress by hammering a steam loom to pieces.
I take a dim view of people trying to frame researchers as criminals. We’re not. We want to further science. That’s all.
You call me a grifter, but I’ve made roughly a hundred bucks from books3, and that’s because someone found my patron buried under a pile of links and subscribed to it many months ago. Most of my researcher colleagues seem to have similar distaste for wanting to make money. The work is the goal.
Well if you did patent it, it's stolen. The equivalent for books is copyright laws, so if the work is protected copyright then yes, you've stolen.
And theft is defined as stealing, which has "to take or appropriate without right or leave and with intent to keep or make use of wrongfully" which applies fully here so...
You can nit pick definitions all day, but you'll find most people would consider this theft, as you're depriving the artist of the rights to their creation. I really feel people who want to argue the other way are a stain on this earth, because you're so happy to defend it...it's just mental gymnastics to a pathetic argument
If you create a work where you can clearly tell what the source was for your inspiration because you stole from another source, it’s a violation of copyright. But if you create a work and you can not tell what the source is of your inspiration, because you stole from so many different sources, not only is not a violation of copyright, but it’s actually the creation of a new copyrighted work in its own right.
ML is short-circuiting this legal framework. Because now stealing from thousands of different authors, in a way that it’s no longer possible to tell the sources can now be done with the press of a button.
When you put your name on someone else's work, I am comfortable calling that theft. That is an issue completely separate from copyright. You're barking up the wrong tree.
My brain contains loads of copyrighted info. And if I exactly reproduce it from memory, it's copyright infringement. But if I come up with my own work, even if using that copyrighted info to learn from, it isn't infringement.
I'm not for or against anything at this point until someone gets their balls out and clearly defines what copyright infringement means in this context.
If you give a bunch of books to a kid all by the same author and then pay that kid to write a book in a similar style and then I go on to sell that book...have I somehow infringed copyright?
The kids book at best is likely to be a very convincing facsimile of the original authors work...but not the authors work.
It seems to me that the only solution for artists is to charge for access to their work in a secure environment then lobotomise people on the way out.
The endgame seems to be "you can view and enjoy our work, but if you want to learn or be inspired by it, thats not on"
It’s unclear that stealing someone’s scientific ideas is a copyright violation. Though it may depend on exactly what was copied and how.
> In no case does copyright protection for an original work of authorship extend to any idea, procedure, process, system, method of operation, concept, principle, or discovery, regardless of the form in which it is described, explained, illustrated, or embodied in such work
Copyright is there to allow you to stop other people from copying your work, but it doesn't give you control over anything else that they might do with it.
If I buy your painting, you can stop me from making copies and selling them to other people, but you can't stop me from selling my original copy to whomever I want, nor could you stop me from painting little dinosaurs all over it and hanging it in my hallway.
That means that if I buy your painting, I'm also free to study it and learn from it in whichever way I please. Studying something is not copying it.
I fundamentally object to the notion that the government gives you a right to a monopoly on an idea, for what looks like perpetuity -- nothing has gone out of copyright since 1923.
Second, you seem to confuse stealing with copying. Stealing means you've lost something i.e. no longer have it. This is clearly not the case with copying.
Third, the comparison to slavery was only to disprove your assertion "Doing something wrong to someone else who did something wrong is still wrong." It was in no attempting to compare the two, the injustice found in slavery is far more egregious than that of any IP case.
Do you think it's ok for a teacher to photocopy portions of a book or article to pass out to their students? This is allowed under the current system. Shouldn't each student be forced to buy the book or article? Are they stealing from the author? What about showing a clip from a movie? How does fair use apply to software? Why does fair use apply to other forms of creation but not software? Why don't mathematicians or physicist get to copyright their discoveries - i can't reuse the plot of a movie (hell, I can't even summarize it: http://bulk.resource.org/courts.gov/c/F2/996/996.F2d.1366.92...), but I can reuse someone else's discoveries? This is not an easy issue. Do you think wikileaks should be shutdown since it posts material it shouldn't have? Why is it ok in some cases and not ok in others? How are the lines drawn?
Do I think that people should be compensated for their work? Of course I do; however, I do not think that copyright is the correct mechanism. Injustice is injustice and should not be left in place just because it's convenient. I think a better way would be to have those purchasing your software sign an agreement that if they distribute it without your permission they must pay X amount of dollars, for they are the only ones you have any legal claim on. I'm not trying to encourage piracy, but I am taking the position that copyright is not legitimate.
I think your stuck in a mindset in which people can be compensated only by through copyright, and I don't think that's the case. I can't predict what the business model that would eventually arise is going to look like. But I am certain one would emerge. Additionally, I think that majority of software developers are actually employed on applications that are not sold to the public commercially so perhaps large portions of the software industry would not even be effected (banking, aerospace, hr, etc).
As for the personal references, yes i create things and understand the effort and all that jazz. But once again, I think that the current system in unethical and will eventually be replaced, perhaps by thinking through it now we can hope to improve the situation and not re-architect the internet and destroy many civil liberties to try and keep an outdated business model going.
Do you think the creator of a piece of art has any rights whatsoever? You're basically endorsing the idea that if you stumble across some original work that you're able to make a copy of, there's nothing wrong with falsely declaring yourself the author of it and collecting money from anyone you can trick into believing this.
This is similar to the questions around "Blurred Lines" and whether or not it was a copy of a copyrighted work or just inspired by another work but still a creative work of its own.
Look at industries that aren't protected by copyright, like fashion. There is a lot of progress and change in that industry because it's legal to borrow from other people's ideas while still making a unique work.
Scientific progress is another area that requires the sharing of knowledge and ideas freely in order for all of society to benefit and progress.
I'm not convinced that borrowing, even heavily, from someone else to make a new work is a bad thing as seems to be the implication in this article.
That is a fake argument. It has been proven wrong on every one of these articles, yet pro-stealing people like yourself keep posting it. You can't copyright such works, only an 'installation' of those works. If you want to talk about copyright, maybe educate yourself on copyright. It's Title 17. https://www.copyright.gov/title17/
The idea that the copyright to a piece of artwork is an asset which can be owned, and therefore stolen, is a relatively recent invention of dubious social utility. For this completely new field of human endeavor, we could choose many different precedents to apply when inventing rules of conduct.
The history of private property is rife with abuse and exploitation. We should not rush to extend such ideas into new arenas.
You have four examples of using replicable stuff that has been shared publicly, and you call two of them stealing.
All I can take away from this is the absurdity of intellectual property laws in general. I agree with the GP, if people are sharing stuff, it's fair game. If you don't want people using stuff you made, keep it to yourself. Pretending we can apply controls to how freely available info is used is silly anyway
> It's only infringement if you actually copy someone else's work.
This is inaccurate. Copyright has been extended to cover fictional characters for instance.
Consider that at the copyright term of 144 years proposed, the character of Count Dracula would still be under copyright, and not freely usable for artistic works.
If you read a book and use the instructions to build a bicycle you are learning a new skill and this is obviously not exploitation of people's work.
When you read a book and copy this book partially or entirely to create a new book or create a derivative work using this book without citation it's called plagiarism and copyright infringement. It is not only exploitation, it is against the law.
If you feed an entire library to an AI to generate new books without source citation and copyright agreements it is not only exploitation, it is against the law. We can call this automated plagiarism and copyright infringement, and automated or not, it is against the law. Except if you use public domain books. It wouldn't be illegal but highly unethical considering there are powerful companies with big pockets bending public domain's laws to avoid their assets to be public available (I'm looking at you Disney), but that is another story.
Making an illegal copy isn't stealing the copyright, though.
If I copy paulgraham.com and post all his essays, claim they are my own, and then try to sue him for infringement, I'm trying to steal his intellectual property.
If I copy some of his essays without his permission, I've infringed.on some of the exclusive rights granted by law. I'm not stealing.
I wasn't talking about someone creating and selling copies of someone else's work, fortunately.
So my point stands and your completely is in agreement with me that people are allowed to learn from other people's works. If someone wants to learn from someone else's work, that is completely legal no matter the licensing terms.
Instead, it is only distributing copies that is not allowed.
If you believe that training models on art is stealing, then I’m a master ninja, since I’m the creator of books3. And even Stephen King today came out and said that he’s fine with it:
> Would I forbid the teaching (if that is the word) of my stories to computers? Not even if I could. I might as well be King Canute, forbidding the tide to come in. Or a Luddite trying to stop industrial progress by hammering a steam loom to pieces.
https://www.theatlantic.com/books/archive/2023/08/stephen-ki...
If he’s not worried, why are you?
I take a dim view of people trying to frame researchers as criminals. We’re not. We want to further science. That’s all.
You call me a grifter, but I’ve made roughly a hundred bucks from books3, and that’s because someone found my patron buried under a pile of links and subscribed to it many months ago. Most of my researcher colleagues seem to have similar distaste for wanting to make money. The work is the goal.
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