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>But we are allowed to use copyrighted content. We are not allowed to copy copyrighted content. We are allowed to view and consume it, to be influenced by it, a
by scythe 3y ago
>But we are allowed to use copyrighted content. We are not allowed to copy copyrighted content. We are allowed to view and consume it, to be influenced by it, and under many circumstances even outright copy it.
It's important to consider in any legalistic argument over copyright that, unlike conventional property rights which are to some degree prehistoric, copyright is a recent legal construct that was developed for a particular economic purpose.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intellectual_property#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intellectual_property#History
The existing standards of fair use are what they are because copyright was developed with supporting the art industry as an intentional goal, not because it was handed down from the heavens or follows a basic human instinct. Ancient playwrights clipped each others' ideas liberally; late medieval economists observed that restricting this behavior seemed to encourage more creativity. Copyright law is a creation of humans, for humans, and is subordinate to moral and economic reasoning, not prior to it.
- ls612 3y agoCopyright only makes any sense for goods with a high fixed cost of production and low to zero marginal cost. Any further use beyond solving that problem is pure rent seeking behavior Also, with computers being functional copyright has become a tool of social control; any function in a physical object can be taken away from you at a whim with no recourse so long as a computer can be inserted into the object. Absent a major change in how society sees copyright I envision a very bleak totalitarian future arising from this trend.
- Ferret7446 3y agoNo, copyright only makes sense insofar that it provides a net positive value for society: that it promotes/protects more creativity leading to economic output than it prevents. That is, does the amount of creative/economic output dissuaded by allowing AI (preventing people who would not be able to or not want to create art if they couldn't get paid) exceed the creative/economic output of letting people develop and use such AIs?
- ls612 3y agoGenAI reduces the fixed cost of creating images/text/whatever which all else equal will increase the amount created. Whether or not you think that is a good thing is probably mostly a function of do you make money creating these things or do you pay money to have these things created.
- freejazz 3y agoDon't put the cart before the horse. What art will we have for AI to copy if there's no more artists next generation?
- ls612 3y agoThe future of good AI art is Adobe Firefly; a tool in a picture editor which gives users great productivity for certain tasks. Artists won’t go extinct; they will be able to produce a lot more art.
- freejazz 3y agoThat's the future of AI art - but is AI art the future of art? if AI artists can't maintain any profit from their work, how are they going to afford the compute time?
- kelnos 3y ago> Copyright only makes any sense for goods with a high fixed cost of production and low to zero marginal cost. If that's the case, then novels, news articles, digital images, etc. are things that copyright absolutely makes sense for. If you think that they have a "low cost of production", you are sadly misinformed about the artistic process. Some of these have vanishingly low marginal costs when it comes to reproduction, but in light of their high fixed cost of production, I don't see how that matters.
- MacsHeadroom 3y agoNovels maybe. News articles, with rare exception, and digital images absolutely do not have high fixed costs of production.
- MacsHeadroom 3y ago> Copyright only makes any sense for goods with a high fixed cost of production and low to zero marginal cost. Any further use beyond solving that problem is pure rent seeking behavior 100% agree. But even then it's not very good. Abolish copyright, severely limit patents, and leave trademarks as they are. The IP paradigm needs an overhaul.