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When you train a GenAI on an image, legally speaking you're training it on a COPY of that image. If you intend to train a GenAI on a copy of an image I own the

by xeckr 3y ago

When you train a GenAI on an image, legally speaking you're training it on a COPY of that image. If you intend to train a GenAI on a copy of an image I own the rights to (perhaps because I created it), then you have to negotiate with me. If you don't, then you are violating my copyright.

csallen 3y ago
That's not how copyright works. Copyright law limits creating copies of a work, not interacting with copies of a work lol. Which means it doesn't apply to training. What you're describing is some totally new law that doesn't exist anywhere on earth, because it would make no sense. Imagine if an aspiring artist who's training by studying a copy of another artist's drawing, or by listening to a copy of another artist's music, gets charged with violating that artist's copyright because they trained on a copy without permission. Again, think of the implications if the laws you're dreaming up actually applied to people today.
- xeckr 3y ago
  >Copyright law limits creating copies of a work When you are downloading someone's copyrighted music to train your GenAI with, the act of downloading it creates a copy of the work that now exists on your computer. The essence of copyright law is to give the owner the right to decide how copies of their work are used, which you have violated if you did the above without their consent. Incidentally, this is why pirating music is a copyright violation. Your argument is based on falsely equating the process of a human getting inspired by prior art to training GenAI on the same. If a human goes to an art gallery and gets inspired by some copyrighted work, he did not have to create a copy of that work for the inspiration to take place. On the other hand, with GenAI training, the act of creating a copy is unavoidable (e.g by taking a picture of a painting, which is uploaded to your computer, which is piped into a training algorithm). The human's mental representation of the painting does not count as a copy, but painting_photo.png does and the owner's rights fully extend to it.
  - csallen 3y ago
    Copyright law only gives owners limited power to decide how copies are used. Not unlimited power. They have the sole right to make, distribute, perform, or display copies of their work… but that's it. They can't forbid others from learning or training by viewing copies of their work. And there are also strong exceptions, notably Fair Use, which outlines situations that allow copyrighted works to be used without anyone's permission. I'm not sure if you're a web programmer or not, but all images, audio, and video on the web work by copying. When you navigate to a website that displays images/audio/video, this works because your browser is automatically downloading those files from the server to your computer, i.e. creating copies. Importantly, this process is identical, whether it's a human browsing the web or GenAI browsing the web. It is 100% unavoidable for both humans and AI to download copies of media that their browsers come across on the internet. 100% of us end up with painting_photo.png on our computers. That's just how browsers work. And that download counts as legal under Fair Use in every single country. Furthermore, once that download has occurred, we all have the legal right to observe these files, to learn from them, to peek into them however we want. There is no law that makes this illegal for humans, nor for GenAI. It is theoretically possible to make a GenAI that illegal makes additional copies of files that the browser has downloaded, but that's entirely unnecessary, as they could simply train on the already-downloaded copy. You have two options: 1. Re-interpret current copyright law in a way that would make it illegal to look at files automatically downloaded when browsing the web. This would make GenAI training methods illegal, but would also make humans browsing the web illegal, since they are identical. 2. Add a new law to the books that would specifically target GenAI and make it illegal for it to do something that is not currently illegal or in violation of any laws. In this case, I would ask you: why on earth would you want to go out of your way to create this unnecessary law that the world is just fine without? I can't think of any reason, except wanting to protect the business model of current artists. Which is lame, imo. We should not be outlawing useful new technologies to protect the profits of people in any industry, including artists.
    - xeckr 3y ago
      Yes, I am a web programmer, and I understand that anytime you are using the internet you are downloading a copy of whatever content it is that you are accessing. You don't even have to invoke fair use here, as the copyright holder gives you the right to access a copy by putting it on the open internet. That does not mean that you automatically have a right to do whatever you please with this copy. If you want to redistribute the content, or use it as part of some commercial process, then you absolutely have to discuss this with the copyright holder, and they have every right to deny you if you cannot agree on the terms. That is the meaning of "all rights reserved". Not all copies are equal. Feel free to enjoy a copy of "Oops!... I Did It Again" that you paid for on iTunes. But download the same file using P2P, and the record company might just have the book thrown at you. The two files are identical copies, but the difference is that the copyright holder gave you the right to listen to the first (in exchange for money) but not the second. Furthermore, downloading the song from iTunes gives you the right to listen to it, but not to play it on loudspeakers at the next conference that you are organizing. To obtain the right to use it for that purpose, you have to negotiate with the record label. Note once again that these restrictions do not apply for works that are e.g. in the public domain, which you are free to use in any way you want. I am in no way arguing for "outlawing useful new technologies", anymore than I am for outlawing cameras because they can be used to create bootleg copies of the latest blockbuster movie. Feel free to train GenAI on copies of works that you have a right to use for that purpose: either because they are in the public domain, or because the copyright owner explicitly gave everyone the right to use a copy of the work to train a GenAI, or because you negotiated a licensing agreement with the copyright owner.

by xeckr 3y ago

csallen 3y ago

That's not how copyright works. Copyright law limits creating copies of a work, not interacting with copies of a work lol. Which means it doesn't apply to training. What you're describing is some totally new law that doesn't exist anywhere on earth, because it would make no sense. Imagine if an aspiring artist who's training by studying a copy of another artist's drawing, or by listening to a copy of another artist's music, gets charged with violating that artist's copyright because they trained on a copy without permission. Again, think of the implications if the laws you're dreaming up actually applied to people today.

xeckr 3y ago
>Copyright law limits creating copies of a work When you are downloading someone's copyrighted music to train your GenAI with, the act of downloading it creates a copy of the work that now exists on your computer. The essence of copyright law is to give the owner the right to decide how copies of their work are used, which you have violated if you did the above without their consent. Incidentally, this is why pirating music is a copyright violation. Your argument is based on falsely equating the process of a human getting inspired by prior art to training GenAI on the same. If a human goes to an art gallery and gets inspired by some copyrighted work, he did not have to create a copy of that work for the inspiration to take place. On the other hand, with GenAI training, the act of creating a copy is unavoidable (e.g by taking a picture of a painting, which is uploaded to your computer, which is piped into a training algorithm). The human's mental representation of the painting does not count as a copy, but painting_photo.png does and the owner's rights fully extend to it.
- csallen 3y ago
  Copyright law only gives owners limited power to decide how copies are used. Not unlimited power. They have the sole right to make, distribute, perform, or display copies of their work… but that's it. They can't forbid others from learning or training by viewing copies of their work. And there are also strong exceptions, notably Fair Use, which outlines situations that allow copyrighted works to be used without anyone's permission. I'm not sure if you're a web programmer or not, but all images, audio, and video on the web work by copying. When you navigate to a website that displays images/audio/video, this works because your browser is automatically downloading those files from the server to your computer, i.e. creating copies. Importantly, this process is identical, whether it's a human browsing the web or GenAI browsing the web. It is 100% unavoidable for both humans and AI to download copies of media that their browsers come across on the internet. 100% of us end up with painting_photo.png on our computers. That's just how browsers work. And that download counts as legal under Fair Use in every single country. Furthermore, once that download has occurred, we all have the legal right to observe these files, to learn from them, to peek into them however we want. There is no law that makes this illegal for humans, nor for GenAI. It is theoretically possible to make a GenAI that illegal makes additional copies of files that the browser has downloaded, but that's entirely unnecessary, as they could simply train on the already-downloaded copy. You have two options: 1. Re-interpret current copyright law in a way that would make it illegal to look at files automatically downloaded when browsing the web. This would make GenAI training methods illegal, but would also make humans browsing the web illegal, since they are identical. 2. Add a new law to the books that would specifically target GenAI and make it illegal for it to do something that is not currently illegal or in violation of any laws. In this case, I would ask you: why on earth would you want to go out of your way to create this unnecessary law that the world is just fine without? I can't think of any reason, except wanting to protect the business model of current artists. Which is lame, imo. We should not be outlawing useful new technologies to protect the profits of people in any industry, including artists.
  - xeckr 3y ago
    Yes, I am a web programmer, and I understand that anytime you are using the internet you are downloading a copy of whatever content it is that you are accessing. You don't even have to invoke fair use here, as the copyright holder gives you the right to access a copy by putting it on the open internet. That does not mean that you automatically have a right to do whatever you please with this copy. If you want to redistribute the content, or use it as part of some commercial process, then you absolutely have to discuss this with the copyright holder, and they have every right to deny you if you cannot agree on the terms. That is the meaning of "all rights reserved". Not all copies are equal. Feel free to enjoy a copy of "Oops!... I Did It Again" that you paid for on iTunes. But download the same file using P2P, and the record company might just have the book thrown at you. The two files are identical copies, but the difference is that the copyright holder gave you the right to listen to the first (in exchange for money) but not the second. Furthermore, downloading the song from iTunes gives you the right to listen to it, but not to play it on loudspeakers at the next conference that you are organizing. To obtain the right to use it for that purpose, you have to negotiate with the record label. Note once again that these restrictions do not apply for works that are e.g. in the public domain, which you are free to use in any way you want. I am in no way arguing for "outlawing useful new technologies", anymore than I am for outlawing cameras because they can be used to create bootleg copies of the latest blockbuster movie. Feel free to train GenAI on copies of works that you have a right to use for that purpose: either because they are in the public domain, or because the copyright owner explicitly gave everyone the right to use a copy of the work to train a GenAI, or because you negotiated a licensing agreement with the copyright owner.