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Judge backs AI firm over use of copyrighted books

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  • C could still bankrupt the company depending on how trial goes. They pirated a lot of books.

    As a civil matter, the publishing houses are more likely to get the full money if anthropic stays in business (and does well). So it might be bad, but I'm really skeptical about bankruptcy (and I'm not hearing anyone seriously floating it?)

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    Anakin: “Judge backs AI firm over use of copyrighted books”
    Padme: “But they’ll be held accountable when they reproduce parts of those works or compete with the work they were trained on, right?”
    Anakin: “…”
    Padme: “Right?”

  • Because of the vast amount of data needed, there will be no competitive viable open source solution if half the data is kept in a walled garden.

    This is about open weights vs closed weights.

    I agree that we need open-source and emancipate ourselves. The main issue I see is: The entire approach doesn't work. I'd like to give the internet as an example. It's meant to be very open, connect everyone and enable them to share information freely. It is set up to be a level playing field... Now look what that leads to. Trillion dollar mega-corporations, privacy issues everywhere and big data silos. That's what the approach promotes. I agree with the goal. But in my opinion the approach will turn out to lead to less open source and more control by rich companies. And that's not what we want.

    Plus nobody even opens the walled gardes. Last time I looked, Reddit wanted money for data. Other big platforms aren't open either. And there's kind of a small war going on with the scrapers and crawlers and anti-measures. So it's not as if it's open as of now.

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    Pirate everything!

  • If you try to sell "the new adventures of Doctor Strange, Jonathan Strange and Magic Man." existing copyright laws are sufficient and will stop it. Really, training should be regulated by the same laws as reading. If they can get the material through legitimate means it should be fine, but pulling data that is not freely accessible should be theft, as it is already.

    I have a freely accessible document that I have a cc license for that states it is not to be used for commercial use. This is commercial use. Your policy would allow for that document to be used though since it is accessible. This kind of policy discourages me from easily sharing my works as others profit from my efforts and my works are more likely to be attributed to a corporate beast I want nothing to do with then to me.

    I'm all for copyright reform and simpler copyright law, but these companies need to be held to standard copyright rules and not just made up modifications.
    I'm convinced a perfectly decent LLM could be built without violating copyrights.

    I'd also be ok sharing works with a not for profit open source LLM and I think others might as well.

  • I agree that we need open-source and emancipate ourselves. The main issue I see is: The entire approach doesn't work. I'd like to give the internet as an example. It's meant to be very open, connect everyone and enable them to share information freely. It is set up to be a level playing field... Now look what that leads to. Trillion dollar mega-corporations, privacy issues everywhere and big data silos. That's what the approach promotes. I agree with the goal. But in my opinion the approach will turn out to lead to less open source and more control by rich companies. And that's not what we want.

    Plus nobody even opens the walled gardes. Last time I looked, Reddit wanted money for data. Other big platforms aren't open either. And there's kind of a small war going on with the scrapers and crawlers and anti-measures. So it's not as if it's open as of now.

    A lot of our laws are indeed obsolete. I think the best solution would be to force copy left licenses on anything using public created data.

    But I'll take the wild west we have now with no walls then any kind of copyright dystopia. Reddit did successfully sell it's data to Google for 60 million. Right now, you can legally scrape anything you want off reddit, it is an open garden in every sense of the word (even if they dont like it). It's a lot more legal then using pirated books, but Google still bet 60 million that copyright laws would swing broadly in their favor.

    I think it's very foolhardy to even hint at a pro copyright stance right now. There is a very real chance of AI getting monopolized and this is how they will do it.

  • A lot of our laws are indeed obsolete. I think the best solution would be to force copy left licenses on anything using public created data.

    But I'll take the wild west we have now with no walls then any kind of copyright dystopia. Reddit did successfully sell it's data to Google for 60 million. Right now, you can legally scrape anything you want off reddit, it is an open garden in every sense of the word (even if they dont like it). It's a lot more legal then using pirated books, but Google still bet 60 million that copyright laws would swing broadly in their favor.

    I think it's very foolhardy to even hint at a pro copyright stance right now. There is a very real chance of AI getting monopolized and this is how they will do it.

    I agree a copyright dystopia wouldn't be any good. Just mind that wild west or law of the jungle is the "right of the strongest". You're advantaging big companies and disadvantaging smaller players or people with ethics or who are more open/transparent.

    And I don't think legality with web scraping is the biggest issue. Sure I maybe could do it if it were possible. But I'm occasionally doing some weird stuff and most services have countermeasures in place. In reality I just can't scrape Reddit. Lot's of bots and crawlers just don't work any more. I'm getting rate limited left and right from all big platforms. Lots of things require an account these days, and services are quick banning me for "suspicious activity". It's barely possible to download Youtube videos these days. So, no. I can't. While Google can just pay for it and have the data.

    Also Reddit isn't really the benevolent underdog here. They're a big company as well. And they're not selling their data... They're selling their user's data. They're mainly monetizing other people's creations.

  • If you try to sell "the new adventures of Doctor Strange, Jonathan Strange and Magic Man." existing copyright laws are sufficient and will stop it. Really, training should be regulated by the same laws as reading. If they can get the material through legitimate means it should be fine, but pulling data that is not freely accessible should be theft, as it is already.

    as it is already

    Copies of copyrighted works cannot be regarded as "stolen property" for the purposes of a prosecution under the National Stolen Property Act of 1934.

    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dowling_v.United_States(1985)

  • used to train both commercial

    commercial training is, in this case, stealing people's work for commercial gain

    and open source language models

    so, uh, let us train open-source models on open-source text. There's so much of it that there's no need to steal.

    ?

    I'm not sure why you added a question mark at the end of your statement.

    I'm not sure why you added a question mark at the end of your statement.

    I was questioning whether or not you would see that as a benefit. Clearly you don't.

    Are you also against libraries letting people borrow books since those are also lost sales for the authors, or are you just a luddite?

  • I'm not sure why you added a question mark at the end of your statement.

    I was questioning whether or not you would see that as a benefit. Clearly you don't.

    Are you also against libraries letting people borrow books since those are also lost sales for the authors, or are you just a luddite?

    libraries letting people borrow books

    This is so far from analogous that it's almost a nonsequitur.

    are you just a luddite?

    No, and you don't even believe such nonsense. You're grasping, ineffectively.

  • Wait, the authors argued that? Why? That's literally the opposite of the thing they needed to argue.

  • As a civil matter, the publishing houses are more likely to get the full money if anthropic stays in business (and does well). So it might be bad, but I'm really skeptical about bankruptcy (and I'm not hearing anyone seriously floating it?)

    Depending on the type of bankruptcy, the business can still operate, all their profits would just be going towards paying off their depts.

  • C could still bankrupt the company depending on how trial goes. They pirated a lot of books.

    It might be that bad. Most 'damage' (as publishers see it) comes from distribution, not the download itself. Depending on how they acquired the books, it might be not be much of a problem.

  • Plantifs made that argument and the judge shoots it down pretty hard. That competition isn't what copyright protects from. He makes an analogy with teachers teaching children to write fiction: they are using existing fantasy to create MANY more competitors on the fiction market. Could an author use copyright to challenge that use?

    Would love to hear your thoughts on the ruling itself (it's linked by reuters).

    Orcs and dwarves (with a v) are creations of Tolkien, if the fantasy stories include them, it's a violation of copyright the same as including Mickey mouse.

    My argument would have been to ask the ai for the bass line to Queen & David Bowie's Under Pressure. Then refer to that as a reproduction of copyrighted material. But then again, AI companies probably have better lawyers than vanilla ice.

  • An 80 year old judge on their best day couldn't be trusted to make an informed decision. This guy was either bought or confused into his decision. Old people gotta go.

    Funny, there's a lot of people on lemmy itself (especially around dbzer0) who would agree with the judge wholeheartedly.

  • Orcs and dwarves (with a v) are creations of Tolkien, if the fantasy stories include them, it's a violation of copyright the same as including Mickey mouse.

    My argument would have been to ask the ai for the bass line to Queen & David Bowie's Under Pressure. Then refer to that as a reproduction of copyrighted material. But then again, AI companies probably have better lawyers than vanilla ice.

    The students read Tolkien, then invent their own settings. The judge thinks this is similar to how claude works. I, nor I suspect the judge, meant that the students were reusing world building whole cloth.

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    Google is hugely anti competitive. Why cant I use a different voice assistant on android? If I disable the google app Inlose voice control of my car. I get in your example they took their time but they were in the embrace phase.
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    omegalemmy@discuss.onlineO
    American individualism is when you believe everyone is as bad as you or worse Self-fulfilling prophecy when they never want to cooperate in fear of being ripped off
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    mcasq_qsacj_234@lemmy.zipM
    At 17:00, on Monday, the 30th of June, in Granary Square, London, PauseAI will be holding our biggest protest yet. It's already Tuesday, July 1st
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    eyekaytee@aussie.zoneE
    They will say something like solar went from 600gw to 1000 thats a 66% increase this year and coal only increased 40% except coal is 3600gw to 6400. Hrmmmm, maybe these numbers are outdated? Based on this coal and gas are down: In Q1 2025, solar generation rose 48% compared to the same period in 2024. Solar power reached 254 TWh, making up 10% of total electricity. This was the largest increase among all clean energy sources. Coal-fired electricity dropped by 4%, falling to 1,421 TWh. Gas-fired power also went down by 4%, reaching 67 TWh https://carboncredits.com/china-sets-clean-energy-record-in-early-2025-with-951-tw/ are no where close to what is required to meet their climate goals Which ones in particular are you talking about? Trump signs executive order directing US withdrawal from the Paris climate agreement — again https://apnews.com/article/trump-paris-agreement-climate-change-788907bb89fe307a964be757313cdfb0 China vowed on Tuesday to continue participating in two cornerstone multinational arrangements -- the World Health Organization and Paris climate accord -- after newly sworn-in US President Donald Trump ordered withdrawals from them. https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20250121-china-says-committed-to-who-paris-climate-deal-after-us-pulls-out What's that saying? You hate it when the person you hate is doing good? I can't remember what it is I can't fault them for what they're doing at the moment, even if they are run by an evil dictatorship and do pollute the most I’m not sure how european defense spending is relevant It suggests there is money available in the bank to fund solar/wind/battery, but instead they are preparing for? something? what? who knows. France can make a fighter jet at home but not solar panels apparently. Prehaps they would be made in a country with environmental and labour laws if governments legislated properly to prevent companies outsourcing manufacturing. However this doesnt absolve china. China isnt being forced at Gunpoint to produce these goods with low labour regulation and low environmental regulation. You're right, it doesn't absolve china, and I avoid purchasing things from them wherever possible, my solar panels and EV were made in South Korea, my home battery was made in Germany, there are only a few things in my house made in China, most of them I got second hand but unfortunately there is no escaping the giant of manufacturing. With that said it's one thing for me to sit here and tut tut at China, but I realise I am not most people, the most clearest example is the extreme anti-ai, anti-billionaire bias on this platform, in real life most people don't give a fuck, they love Amazon/Microsoft/Google/Apple etc, they can't go a day without them. So I consider myself a realist, if you want people to buy your stuff then you will need to make the conditions possible for them to WANT to buy your stuff, not out of some moral lecture and Europe isn't doing that, if we look at energy prices: Can someone actually point out to me where this comes from? ... At the end of the day energy is a small % of EU household spending I was looking at corporate/business energy use: Major European companies are already moving to cut costs and retain their competitive edge. For example, Thyssenkrupp, Germany’s largest steelmaker, said on Monday it would slash 11,000 jobs in its steel division by 2030, in a major corporate reshuffle. https://oilprice.com/Latest-Energy-News/World-News/High-Energy-Costs-Continue-to-Plague-European-Industry.html Prices have since fallen but are still high compared to other countries. A poll by Germany's DIHK Chambers of Industry and Commerce of around 3,300 companies showed that 37% were considering cutting production or moving abroad, up from 31% last year and 16% in 2022. For energy-intensive industrial firms some 45% of companies were mulling slashing output or relocation, the survey showed. "The trust of the German economy in energy policy is severely damaged," Achim Dercks, DIHK deputy chief executive said, adding that the government had not succeeded in providing companies with a perspective for reliable and affordable energy supply. https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/more-german-companies-mull-relocation-due-high-energy-prices-survey-2024-08-01/ I've seen nothing to suggest energy prices in the EU are SO cheap that it's worth moving manufacturing TO Europe, and this is what annoys me the most. I've pointed this out before but they have an excellent report on the issues: https://commission.europa.eu/document/download/97e481fd-2dc3-412d-be4c-f152a8232961_en?filename=The+future+of+European+competitiveness+_+A+competitiveness+strategy+for+Europe.pdf Then they put out this Competitive Compass: https://commission.europa.eu/topics/eu-competitiveness/competitiveness-compass_en But tbh every week in the EU it seems like they are chasing after some other goal. This would be great, it would have been greater 10 years ago. Agreed
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    nokturne213@sopuli.xyzN
    My first set I made myself. The "blackout" backing was white. The curtains themselves were blue with horses I think (I was like 8). I later used the backing with some Star Wars sheets to make new curtains.
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    exec@pawb.socialE
    I mean no more live view via the screen
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    anzo@programming.devA
    Interesting! Python and Bash do the same as British.