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Reproducing exact or near exact copies is a failure mode called overfitting. It's not what these tools are intended for, and when it happens it's typically to t

Reproducing exact or near exact copies is a failure mode called overfitting. It's not what these tools are intended for, and when it happens it's typically to the detriment of the users.

dahart 3y ago
It seems like one of Stable Diffusion’s most popular use cases is give me <situation> in the style of <famous_artist>. I mean the whole point of using AI at all is to get something to give you high quality stuff for free, where the high quality has been lifted from a high quality training set. Getting sorta-kinda copies but ideally without breaking laws kinda is what these tools are explicitly intended and designed for.
- EMIRELADERO 3y ago
  Styles aren't copyrightable.
  - dahart 3y ago
    That’s right, correct. You’re just a lot more likely to infringe on a specific “fixation” of a copyrighted work when the purpose and use centers around getting as close as possible to something that already exists, right?
- baobabKoodaa 3y ago
  > It seems like one of Stable Diffusion’s most popular use cases is give me <situation> in the style of <famous_artist>. You know what's the most popular <style> for Stable Diffusion? Photorealism. And the second most popular <style>? Anime. At the risk of stating the obvious, I will note that no artist can hold the honor of having invented generic "photography" and generic "anime". But sure, I will give you 2 internet points for accurately spotting one of the extremely rare use cases of Stable Diffusion where an artists' style is copied. I agree with you that is not all kosher. > I mean the whole point of using AI at all is to get something to give you high quality stuff for free, where the high quality has been lifted from a high quality training set. No, it's not. It's a failure mode. It's called "overfitting". We went over this. The vast majority of Stable Diffusion's usage is about producing something novel, and reproducing something that looks like a training image is considered a failure.
  - dahart 3y ago
    > no artist can hold the honor of having invented generic “photography” That’s entirely beside the point. Copyright still applies to photographs, and training has been occurring on copyright-protected photographs. > It’s a failure mode It seems like maybe you didn’t fully parse what I said there, which wasn’t about reproducing works closely enough to violate copyright, it was about the broad goal of AI, which absolutely is to train on fixations (in Copyright parlance) and be able to produce mashup results that mimic the inputs as closely as possible without breaking the law. Because the goals here and the design intent here are to skirt the legal lines, it’s not at all surprising that sometimes we will cross it, whether it counts specifically as overfitting or not. When the broad design goal combined with users and prompts seeking specific outcomes is riding the line between mimicking style and clear copying, we’re basically priming the overall system to live in a legal gray area. This is outside the question of whether consuming copyrighted training material is legal, regardless of whether any reproductions occur. Watching copyrighted movies is not legal, I don’t have to share them with anyone else. Why should AI training that consumes copyrighted material even be legal in the first place? (Maybe it’s not.)
    - baobabKoodaa 3y ago
      > That’s entirely beside the point. Copyright still applies to photographs, and training has been occurring on copyright-protected photographs. No, you missed the point. I was making a distinction between artist styles, like "in the style of Picasso", versus generic styles, like "photography". Furthermore, I was making the point that the generic styles, such as "photography", are way more popular in the Stable Diffusion community, compared to artist specific styles, like "in the style of Picasso". Just to spell it out as clearly as possible: the majority of Stable Diffusion usage is not trying to imitate the style of a specific artist. Whether or not training on copyright-protected photographs is legal is tangential to the point. > It seems like maybe you didn’t fully parse what I said there, which wasn’t about reproducing works closely enough to violate copyright, it was about the broad goal of AI, which absolutely is to train on fixations (in Copyright parlance) and be able to produce mashup results that mimic the inputs as closely as possible without breaking the law. I fully understood your point and expressed my disagreement of it. Specifically, what you described is typically not the intended outcome, it is a failure mode. I have repeated this many times now and you keep ignoring me, as if the problem goes away by ignoring it.
- Turing_Machine 3y ago
  > It seems like one of Stable Diffusion’s most popular use cases is give me <situation> in the style of <famous_artist>. Copying the mere style of <famous_artist> has never been a copyright violation. Ever.

Reproducing exact or near exact copies is a failure mode called overfitting. It's not what these tools are intended for, and when it happens it's typically to the detriment of the users.

dahart 3y ago

It seems like one of Stable Diffusion’s most popular use cases is give me <situation> in the style of <famous_artist>. I mean the whole point of using AI at all is to get something to give you high quality stuff for free, where the high quality has been lifted from a high quality training set. Getting sorta-kinda copies but ideally without breaking laws kinda is what these tools are explicitly intended and designed for.

EMIRELADERO 3y ago
Styles aren't copyrightable.
- dahart 3y ago
  That’s right, correct. You’re just a lot more likely to infringe on a specific “fixation” of a copyrighted work when the purpose and use centers around getting as close as possible to something that already exists, right?
baobabKoodaa 3y ago
> It seems like one of Stable Diffusion’s most popular use cases is give me <situation> in the style of <famous_artist>. You know what's the most popular <style> for Stable Diffusion? Photorealism. And the second most popular <style>? Anime. At the risk of stating the obvious, I will note that no artist can hold the honor of having invented generic "photography" and generic "anime". But sure, I will give you 2 internet points for accurately spotting one of the extremely rare use cases of Stable Diffusion where an artists' style is copied. I agree with you that is not all kosher. > I mean the whole point of using AI at all is to get something to give you high quality stuff for free, where the high quality has been lifted from a high quality training set. No, it's not. It's a failure mode. It's called "overfitting". We went over this. The vast majority of Stable Diffusion's usage is about producing something novel, and reproducing something that looks like a training image is considered a failure.
- dahart 3y ago
  > no artist can hold the honor of having invented generic “photography” That’s entirely beside the point. Copyright still applies to photographs, and training has been occurring on copyright-protected photographs. > It’s a failure mode It seems like maybe you didn’t fully parse what I said there, which wasn’t about reproducing works closely enough to violate copyright, it was about the broad goal of AI, which absolutely is to train on fixations (in Copyright parlance) and be able to produce mashup results that mimic the inputs as closely as possible without breaking the law. Because the goals here and the design intent here are to skirt the legal lines, it’s not at all surprising that sometimes we will cross it, whether it counts specifically as overfitting or not. When the broad design goal combined with users and prompts seeking specific outcomes is riding the line between mimicking style and clear copying, we’re basically priming the overall system to live in a legal gray area. This is outside the question of whether consuming copyrighted training material is legal, regardless of whether any reproductions occur. Watching copyrighted movies is not legal, I don’t have to share them with anyone else. Why should AI training that consumes copyrighted material even be legal in the first place? (Maybe it’s not.)
  - baobabKoodaa 3y ago
    > That’s entirely beside the point. Copyright still applies to photographs, and training has been occurring on copyright-protected photographs. No, you missed the point. I was making a distinction between artist styles, like "in the style of Picasso", versus generic styles, like "photography". Furthermore, I was making the point that the generic styles, such as "photography", are way more popular in the Stable Diffusion community, compared to artist specific styles, like "in the style of Picasso". Just to spell it out as clearly as possible: the majority of Stable Diffusion usage is not trying to imitate the style of a specific artist. Whether or not training on copyright-protected photographs is legal is tangential to the point. > It seems like maybe you didn’t fully parse what I said there, which wasn’t about reproducing works closely enough to violate copyright, it was about the broad goal of AI, which absolutely is to train on fixations (in Copyright parlance) and be able to produce mashup results that mimic the inputs as closely as possible without breaking the law. I fully understood your point and expressed my disagreement of it. Specifically, what you described is typically not the intended outcome, it is a failure mode. I have repeated this many times now and you keep ignoring me, as if the problem goes away by ignoring it.
Turing_Machine 3y ago
> It seems like one of Stable Diffusion’s most popular use cases is give me <situation> in the style of <famous_artist>. Copying the mere style of <famous_artist> has never been a copyright violation. Ever.