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The Times Sues OpenAI and Microsoft Over A.I. Use of Copyrighted Work
(www.nytimes.com)
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this post was submitted on 27 Dec 2023
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The NYT as a company is much closer to its authors than AI is to its authors. When it exercises copyright, the owners of those copyrights are the NYT, but the authors are the ... Well, authors. You're right that a victory means newspapers get a lot more money.
... But would that be a bad thing? If newspapers become more profitable again, maybe we can see a resurgence of local papers and more reliable news. Instead of MSNBC and Fox and CNN, various papers could be our main media sources.
In any case -- there's times when business interests align with employee interests, and this is one of them. The NYT is effectively saying with this lawsuit that OpenAI et al. have been stealing from them, and by proxy, the authors. A victory in this court case would strengthen author rights and ownership. A loss would mean big corporations can take anything made by the public, use it for their AI, and then charge money for it. The training materials have a quantifiable value in what a trained model sells for versus an untrained model.
Ok, I see. It's "trickle-down economics". Sorry, if you don't like the term. Feel free to suggest a better one.
The simple fact is, it won't work.
There is no reason for the NYT, or any other newspaper, to share the profit. I'm not saying that none of the owners will, but most won't. Even the generous ones won't bother tracking down former employees or their heirs. In fairness, that's not economics. It's just an observation about how people behave. I do note, though, that you are not actually claiming that the authors will get paid.
It won't make newspapers more profitable, either. The owners of old newspapers will be able to extract a rent for their archives. But where would the extra cash flow for a new newspaper come from? You could say that they have a new potential buyer. But the US population is growing and every new person in the US is a new potential buyer. Every new business is a potential new advertising client. Having a new potential buyer is just not going to make the difference. Although, I do note that you are not actually claiming that this would make newspapers more profitable.
At least I can say that in the last paragraph, you are wrong:
No. It will not strengthen authors. Strengthening ownership strengthens owners. Strengthening ownership of buildings, strengthens landlords and does not strengthen construction workers. They have already been paid in full.
I don't know if the poster, I originally replied to, agrees with you, but I can definitely say that I simply do not share your ideology. I hold the view that intellectual property is a privilege granted by society, for the benefit of society. Call that socialism if you like, it's in the US Constitution. OTOH, You clearly believe that IP entitles someone to a benefit from society, regardless of any harm to society. I don't know if you believe in these suggested trickle-down benefits. I find it disturbing that you actually did not go so far as to make a definitive claim.
If IP is freely given to AI developers, and the AI they create is freely given to the public, I have no issue at all. In fact, I'd love for that to happen. What I don't want is what you describe at the end -- companies use public and freely given IP to create a closed product sold for profit. And that's exactly what I see these AI as. As long as they have a premium model, they're benefiting from society and profiting privately.
I think we actually agree on a fundamental level what the ideal situation and dynamic should be. I just think the NYT winning the court case brings us closer to that ideal. And I think we both detest the idea of OpenAI getting rich off of other people.
I really doubt we agree on any level. You're pitching a neo-feudal hellhole. I don't know if you believe that you will be one of the lucky few, or if you believe that the magic of the market will fix things. If it's the former, then play the lottery instead. If it's the latter, then you are just wrong. If you believe that you are just arguing for good ole American capitalism, then you are deluding yourself. This is the kind of nonsense that was abolished at the birth of the US, or any other developed nation. It won't work. Never has, never will.
We agree that information should be freely given and provided to create products that are freely given and provided. We agree that it's bad for information to be freely given to create products which are sold for private gain.
I'm not sure you're understanding what I'm saying. Do you disagree with any of the above? When it comes to this specific court case, either the NYT will win or OpenAI will win, and I'm saying the NYT winning is the better of the two outcomes. I'm not saying it's the ideal we aspire to by any means.