4 ms·

I think copyright itself might be on its way out. What meaning does a copyright have when I can click "Variations" on anything and get 4 suggestions in 10 secon

I think copyright itself might be on its way out. What meaning does a copyright have when I can click "Variations" on anything and get 4 suggestions in 10 seconds? Imagine how good they will be by 2030.

izacus 4y ago
There has never been more support for tightening and enforcing copyright than there is today. This is very unlikely to change due to megacorps like Microsoft, Disney, Apple et.al. having a massive vested interest to use it to extract maximum profits.
- classified 4y ago
  Copyright protection for the rich and powerful, while those who cannot afford armies of lawyers get their stuff stolen by machine learning models. Sounds credible to me.
  - 6stringmerc 4y ago
    I’m not rich and powerful but I’m glad Disney is going to destroy MystickInk on principle. Check out my essay I’ve submitted recently.
  - guntars 4y ago
    I find Copilot most useful for filling out debug statements such as this: println(“foo at {:x} is {:?}”, &foo as *const _ as usize, foo); It almost always writes what I would have. How DARE I steal from open source contributors like that?!
    - 3836293648 4y ago
      Given how rust-y that looks, are you aware of `dbg!`? Debug printing + file name + line number and it does it properly to stderr
    - classified 4y ago
      A human re-using some code according to its license is not the same as an automated machine snorting up all of the code on the platform ignoring any licenses.
LesZedCB 4y ago
there's a great youtube doc about everything being remixing which i highly recommend https://www.everythingisaremix.info/ https://www.everythingisaremix.info/
esalman 4y ago
Have you tried that on any kind of music?
throwaway290 4y ago
Copyright becomes especially important and valuable in these circumstances. Remember, original works is how your variation suggestion engine is trained. With remaining incentives taken away there is no more new stuff to train on, networks get trained on own output, the snake eats own tail.
- guhayun 4y ago
  >networks get trained on own output And sometimes the network improves,depending on the quality or direction of the output,the client can a valuable critic even without being an expert in the field
  - throwaway290 4y ago
    Excellent, let's see how your client critiques and improves on a song, an artwork or some source code suggested by Copilot. (By the way, do you have an objection to my point? I must have missed it.)
    - NavinF 4y ago
      You didn't make a point. Training generative models on their own output after filtering for quality is a well known technique for improving image quality for a single mode. This can happen automatically when generated images become popular on the internet. "Excellent, let's see how your car goes faster when you push the gas pedal"
      - throwaway290 4y ago
        If you are saying that hypothetical client knows a better song/artwork/code from worse, boy are you in for disappointment... My point was that insane amounts of curated fully original works were required to get the output of these generative tools to the "occasionally impressive" level it is at now, and those original works exist precisely thanks to copyright. To say "oh we don't need copyright now" is to saw off the branch on which this hinges. If you are into this stuff and want to see it become better you should rather promote copyright and differentiation of fully original works.
hooby 4y ago
Copyright was originally intended to protect the creators of a work. Over many years it has now mostly become a tool for large companies to accumulate rights (on works they didn't create themselves) and monetize them. Maybe a reform is needed, to find a way back to the original purpose.
- dragonwriter 4y ago
  > Copyright was originally intended to protect the creators of a work. No, it wasn’t. Copyright was originally intended to protect the publishers of a work. It was later transformed to nominally focus on the creators, but even this was lobbied for by publishers in their own self-interest after the old law directly protecting them was allowed to lapse, and because it still had the same net effect since realizing value meant licensing to a publisher in most practical cases, so the publishers were still major beneficiaries. And, of course, US copyrights under the Constitution do not exist for the purpose of protecting creators, instead a private benefit for creators is a mechanism but the purpose is expressly to “promote the progress of science of useful arts”.
  - 6stringmerc 4y ago
    Wrong! At the point of creation something is granted copyright. Publishers in literature and music are right assholes who’ve created this system. Little middle men rent seeking. It does need reform but it is for the creators that’s why it’s tied to the creator and not date of publication. Fix your perspective buckaroo
    - dragonwriter 4y ago
      > It does need reform but it is for the creators No, under the US Constitution it is for a specified public benefit as its purpose, the private benefit is a mechanism to achieve that. Under the Statute of Anne, it was nominally for creators (but this was lobbied for by printers after the expiration of earlier laws, and they were the prime beneficiaries in practice.) The earlier laws were explicitly for printers.

izacus 4y ago

There has never been more support for tightening and enforcing copyright than there is today. This is very unlikely to change due to megacorps like Microsoft, Disney, Apple et.al. having a massive vested interest to use it to extract maximum profits.

classified 4y ago
Copyright protection for the rich and powerful, while those who cannot afford armies of lawyers get their stuff stolen by machine learning models. Sounds credible to me.
- 6stringmerc 4y ago
  I’m not rich and powerful but I’m glad Disney is going to destroy MystickInk on principle. Check out my essay I’ve submitted recently.
- guntars 4y ago
  I find Copilot most useful for filling out debug statements such as this: println(“foo at {:x} is {:?}”, &foo as *const _ as usize, foo); It almost always writes what I would have. How DARE I steal from open source contributors like that?!
  - 3836293648 4y ago
    Given how rust-y that looks, are you aware of `dbg!`? Debug printing + file name + line number and it does it properly to stderr
  - classified 4y ago
    A human re-using some code according to its license is not the same as an automated machine snorting up all of the code on the platform ignoring any licenses.

LesZedCB 4y ago

there's a great youtube doc about everything being remixing which i highly recommend https://www.everythingisaremix.info/ https://www.everythingisaremix.info/

esalman 4y ago

Have you tried that on any kind of music?

throwaway290 4y ago

Copyright becomes especially important and valuable in these circumstances. Remember, original works is how your variation suggestion engine is trained. With remaining incentives taken away there is no more new stuff to train on, networks get trained on own output, the snake eats own tail.

guhayun 4y ago
>networks get trained on own output And sometimes the network improves,depending on the quality or direction of the output,the client can a valuable critic even without being an expert in the field
- throwaway290 4y ago
  Excellent, let's see how your client critiques and improves on a song, an artwork or some source code suggested by Copilot. (By the way, do you have an objection to my point? I must have missed it.)
  - NavinF 4y ago
    You didn't make a point. Training generative models on their own output after filtering for quality is a well known technique for improving image quality for a single mode. This can happen automatically when generated images become popular on the internet. "Excellent, let's see how your car goes faster when you push the gas pedal"
    - throwaway290 4y ago
      If you are saying that hypothetical client knows a better song/artwork/code from worse, boy are you in for disappointment... My point was that insane amounts of curated fully original works were required to get the output of these generative tools to the "occasionally impressive" level it is at now, and those original works exist precisely thanks to copyright. To say "oh we don't need copyright now" is to saw off the branch on which this hinges. If you are into this stuff and want to see it become better you should rather promote copyright and differentiation of fully original works.

hooby 4y ago

Copyright was originally intended to protect the creators of a work. Over many years it has now mostly become a tool for large companies to accumulate rights (on works they didn't create themselves) and monetize them. Maybe a reform is needed, to find a way back to the original purpose.

dragonwriter 4y ago
> Copyright was originally intended to protect the creators of a work. No, it wasn’t. Copyright was originally intended to protect the publishers of a work. It was later transformed to nominally focus on the creators, but even this was lobbied for by publishers in their own self-interest after the old law directly protecting them was allowed to lapse, and because it still had the same net effect since realizing value meant licensing to a publisher in most practical cases, so the publishers were still major beneficiaries. And, of course, US copyrights under the Constitution do not exist for the purpose of protecting creators, instead a private benefit for creators is a mechanism but the purpose is expressly to “promote the progress of science of useful arts”.
- 6stringmerc 4y ago
  Wrong! At the point of creation something is granted copyright. Publishers in literature and music are right assholes who’ve created this system. Little middle men rent seeking. It does need reform but it is for the creators that’s why it’s tied to the creator and not date of publication. Fix your perspective buckaroo
  - dragonwriter 4y ago
    > It does need reform but it is for the creators No, under the US Constitution it is for a specified public benefit as its purpose, the private benefit is a mechanism to achieve that. Under the Statute of Anne, it was nominally for creators (but this was lobbied for by printers after the expiration of earlier laws, and they were the prime beneficiaries in practice.) The earlier laws were explicitly for printers.