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Do you feel the same about spreadsheet software reducing the need for accountants? What about textile workers creating fabric for clothing by hand? Or do we o

by xscott 1y ago

Do you feel the same about spreadsheet software reducing the need for accountants? What about textile workers creating fabric for clothing by hand? Or do we only romanticize artists such that they're entitled to an income?

BobaFloutist 1y ago
Does spreadsheet software have to be trained directly on the copyright-lrptected work of the accountants it's replacing without their consent (and often against their loud protesting)?
DrScientist 1y ago
Of course not - you are confusing competition with theft. It's the difference between you writing a piece of competing software and taking my market share, versus you stealing my software and selling it as your own. Or you attempting to write a competing best seller versus copying mine wholesale and selling under your own name on Amazon. One activity is ultimately creative destruction that pushes society forward - the other is simply destructive free riding. ie theft involves no creation of value. Now the situation with tech companies is that there is theft, but also value add ( like somebody stealing your book and putting a better cover on it online ). Just because there is some value add doesn't forgive the theft.
- xscott 1y ago
  Did you edit your post above? Even slightly? Because I was replying specifically to the idea that artists have a right to a livelihood, and I think you changed a few words to add the copying bit. I should be more consistent about pasting in the text I'm replying to. Regardless, you really should learn the difference between "theft", "copyright violation", and "training", because they are different things. If I read a bunch of books, learn from the authors' use of word phrasing, then pick one of Vonnegut's 8 Story Shapes, and make a book in some author's style, it's not illegal. I don't see why I can't have a computer do that for me. None of this really matters. If you feel strongly about it, you should go bribe congress to make a law. Because the existing laws about theft and copyright don't cover "learning from billions of examples and interpolating or extrapolating from them".
  - DrScientist 1y ago
    I edited it to make it more readable - not changed it's meaning. In terms of the substance - bottom line they have taken something without permission and sold it on. Sure - they have added value in the process - but if I steal your car and mash it up with another one before selling it on - it's still theft. The original post was implying there was no harm as a result because it's just copying - the original owner was not deprived of anything. My point was they are potentially being deprived of a living - and that's through stuff being taken without permission - not through fair competition. What matters here is not the semnatics of theft or copyright or whatever - what matters is fairness - and I accept that's a judgement. I don't see a problem with these companies having to either pay to incorporate material into their models or/and the authors having the right to refuse to license. Note - that's not to stand in the way of the development of these tools, but to ensure that the effort that went in to creating them ( which includes the generation of the source material ) is properly rewarded. If OpenAI etc al think creation is a trivial part and it doesn't need rewarding - they are free to bootstrap their models by creating all the inputs from scratch.
    - DrScientist 1y ago
      Perhaps you think it's fine if I took a copy of ChatGPT model without permission and started a competing service - which was cheaper because I didn't have to pay for the training costs? They haven't lost anything - just took a copy..... Are they going to stand in the way of me making the output of chatgpt more widely available through my cheaper pricing????? And note I'm selling access to the output - which is different everytime ( I use a different random number seed from them ) - so I'm not selling the copy of model per se...... perfectly fair use....
      - xscott 1y ago
        > Perhaps you think it's fine if I took a copy of ChatGPT model without permission [...] There are laws about copyright and trade secret. > They haven't lost anything - just took a copy..... Correct. This is why it's a copyright violation and not a theft. > [...] fair use.... Fair use is also a legal term, and it has some (reasonably) specific meanings. It's noteworthy that the large copyright protection industries don't respect those terms and have automated DMCA takedowns to abuse people for things which age legal: "the fair use of a copyrighted work, including such use by reproduction in copies or phonorecords or by any other means specified by that section, for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research, is not an infringement of copyright." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fair_use https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fair_use

by xscott 1y ago

BobaFloutist 1y ago

Does spreadsheet software have to be trained directly on the copyright-lrptected work of the accountants it's replacing without their consent (and often against their loud protesting)?

DrScientist 1y ago

Of course not - you are confusing competition with theft. It's the difference between you writing a piece of competing software and taking my market share, versus you stealing my software and selling it as your own. Or you attempting to write a competing best seller versus copying mine wholesale and selling under your own name on Amazon. One activity is ultimately creative destruction that pushes society forward - the other is simply destructive free riding. ie theft involves no creation of value. Now the situation with tech companies is that there is theft, but also value add ( like somebody stealing your book and putting a better cover on it online ). Just because there is some value add doesn't forgive the theft.

xscott 1y ago
Did you edit your post above? Even slightly? Because I was replying specifically to the idea that artists have a right to a livelihood, and I think you changed a few words to add the copying bit. I should be more consistent about pasting in the text I'm replying to. Regardless, you really should learn the difference between "theft", "copyright violation", and "training", because they are different things. If I read a bunch of books, learn from the authors' use of word phrasing, then pick one of Vonnegut's 8 Story Shapes, and make a book in some author's style, it's not illegal. I don't see why I can't have a computer do that for me. None of this really matters. If you feel strongly about it, you should go bribe congress to make a law. Because the existing laws about theft and copyright don't cover "learning from billions of examples and interpolating or extrapolating from them".
- DrScientist 1y ago
  I edited it to make it more readable - not changed it's meaning. In terms of the substance - bottom line they have taken something without permission and sold it on. Sure - they have added value in the process - but if I steal your car and mash it up with another one before selling it on - it's still theft. The original post was implying there was no harm as a result because it's just copying - the original owner was not deprived of anything. My point was they are potentially being deprived of a living - and that's through stuff being taken without permission - not through fair competition. What matters here is not the semnatics of theft or copyright or whatever - what matters is fairness - and I accept that's a judgement. I don't see a problem with these companies having to either pay to incorporate material into their models or/and the authors having the right to refuse to license. Note - that's not to stand in the way of the development of these tools, but to ensure that the effort that went in to creating them ( which includes the generation of the source material ) is properly rewarded. If OpenAI etc al think creation is a trivial part and it doesn't need rewarding - they are free to bootstrap their models by creating all the inputs from scratch.
  - DrScientist 1y ago
    Perhaps you think it's fine if I took a copy of ChatGPT model without permission and started a competing service - which was cheaper because I didn't have to pay for the training costs? They haven't lost anything - just took a copy..... Are they going to stand in the way of me making the output of chatgpt more widely available through my cheaper pricing????? And note I'm selling access to the output - which is different everytime ( I use a different random number seed from them ) - so I'm not selling the copy of model per se...... perfectly fair use....
    - xscott 1y ago
      > Perhaps you think it's fine if I took a copy of ChatGPT model without permission [...] There are laws about copyright and trade secret. > They haven't lost anything - just took a copy..... Correct. This is why it's a copyright violation and not a theft. > [...] fair use.... Fair use is also a legal term, and it has some (reasonably) specific meanings. It's noteworthy that the large copyright protection industries don't respect those terms and have automated DMCA takedowns to abuse people for things which age legal: "the fair use of a copyrighted work, including such use by reproduction in copies or phonorecords or by any other means specified by that section, for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research, is not an infringement of copyright." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fair_use https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fair_use