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Replying to a deleted comment: > It sounds as if you imply that would be bad. But what if it wasn't? Entirely possible. The early history of aviation was open

Replying to a deleted comment: > It sounds as if you imply that would be bad. But what if it wasn't? Entirely possible. The early history of aviation was open source in the sense that many unlicensed people participated, and died. The world is strictly better with licensing requirements in place for that field. But no one knows. And if history is any guide for software, it seems better to err on freedoms that happen to have some downside rather then clamping down on them. One could imagine a world where BitTorrent was illegal. Or cryptography, or bitcoin.

raverbashing 3y ago
Are you really comparing licensing for a profession with licensing of IP?
- sillysaurusx 3y ago
  It’s much the same. Only authorized people are allowed to do X. Since X costs a lot of money, by definition it can’t be open source. There are no hobbyist pilots that carry passengers without a license, and if there are, they’re quickly told to stop. Generative AI faces a real chance of having the same fate. Which means open source will look similar to these planes trying to compete with commercial aircraft: https://pilotinstitute.com/flying-without-a-license/ https://pilotinstitute.com/flying-without-a-license/ If you can think of a better example, I’d like to know though. I’ll use it in future discussions. It’s hard to think of good analogies when the tech has new social effects.
  - PeterStuer 3y ago
    If I fly a plane and crash, my passengers die. If I generate an image using a model whose training included some unlicensed imagery... Disney misses out on a fraction of a cent? There is a real reason why some professions are licenced and others are not. Your analogy is nonsensical. Not having a better one is irrelevant.
    - sillysaurusx 3y ago
      If training data requires licensing fees, ML practitioners will become a licensed field de facto, because no one in the open source world will have the resources to pursue it on their own. Perhaps a better analogy is movies. At least with acting, you can make your own movies, even if you’re on a shoestring budget. With ML, you quite literally can’t make a useful model. There’s not enough uncopyrighted data to do anything remotely close to commercial models, even in spirit.
      - avisser 3y ago
        > If training data requires licensing fees, ML practitioners will become a licensed field de facto, You know the word "license" has multiple, dissimilar meanings, right?

raverbashing 3y ago

Are you really comparing licensing for a profession with licensing of IP?

sillysaurusx 3y ago
It’s much the same. Only authorized people are allowed to do X. Since X costs a lot of money, by definition it can’t be open source. There are no hobbyist pilots that carry passengers without a license, and if there are, they’re quickly told to stop. Generative AI faces a real chance of having the same fate. Which means open source will look similar to these planes trying to compete with commercial aircraft: https://pilotinstitute.com/flying-without-a-license/ https://pilotinstitute.com/flying-without-a-license/ If you can think of a better example, I’d like to know though. I’ll use it in future discussions. It’s hard to think of good analogies when the tech has new social effects.
- PeterStuer 3y ago
  If I fly a plane and crash, my passengers die. If I generate an image using a model whose training included some unlicensed imagery... Disney misses out on a fraction of a cent? There is a real reason why some professions are licenced and others are not. Your analogy is nonsensical. Not having a better one is irrelevant.
  - sillysaurusx 3y ago
    If training data requires licensing fees, ML practitioners will become a licensed field de facto, because no one in the open source world will have the resources to pursue it on their own. Perhaps a better analogy is movies. At least with acting, you can make your own movies, even if you’re on a shoestring budget. With ML, you quite literally can’t make a useful model. There’s not enough uncopyrighted data to do anything remotely close to commercial models, even in spirit.
    - avisser 3y ago
      > If training data requires licensing fees, ML practitioners will become a licensed field de facto, You know the word "license" has multiple, dissimilar meanings, right?