I like Molly White’s recent take, that it might be more productive to treat this as a labor issue instead of a copyright issue (at least in principle). Even if the AI corporations aren’t technically re-selling copyrighted works, they’re still profiting from the authors’ unpaid labor.
this post was submitted on 20 Mar 2025
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That's an evergreen. Tried and trusty.
Copyright law needs to be fixed, and not in favor of these corporations, but in favor of artists.
Wanting copyright law to be fixed does not mean wanting it go away entirely for the sake of bullshit like LLMs.
Check out the research of Rufus Pollock who did a bunch of complex math to show ideal copyright length should be 15 years.
https://rufuspollock.com/papers/optimal_copyright_term.pdf
If the admins of the Pirate Bay got put in prison for far less piracy and far less profit from piracy... the same ought to happen to Sam Altman et. al.
Good stuff. Too many people lately are all "no copyright would be an improvement." Yeah, maybe for the corps who could freely use your output as they wish.
What a brilliant Idea. Hover up all copyrighted works then regurgitate it in different forms without having to pay the copyright owners. Sounds like a great tech bro idea.
The finance bros tried that one too. Mortgage-backed security was the magic word. Cut up all the little mortgages, repackage them, and sell for profit. Then it all crashed down in 2008.
There's no problem. Those books should all be in the public domain anyway.
Why, so you can profit from it?
So that everyone can experience it mostly. Potentially, yes, they could profit from it too, possibly, yes.
I just want to make it clear, I am a hobby writer who regularly releases my work PD.
Just reading it is already profitting from the written work. The author should have the freedom to decide whether they want monetary compensation for that or not. Isn't this a free world? You should respect it when people decide to publish IP under permissive licenses. It's their work. They can decide. Everyone who is against this and for piracy needs to have their moral compass checked by looking in the mirror. This is a free world, if you like it or not.
Sure. And they'll get paid by the person who chooses to buy it to release it, or by the library.