I'm not sure why, but there's something about intellectual property that makes folks struggle with legality versus morality. I suspect reasons range from the desire to do piracy without reprisal to ardent belief that there is no such thing as "intellectual property."
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@mttaggart You can’t be saying this is *easy* to untangle? It’s been a subject of active contention in law and politics and commerce since at least the 1700s, and smart people have ended up on almost every imaginable position.
@mttaggart Pardon me but you listed two reasons for finding the balance of copyright law difficult. One was pure selfishness, and the other was being a rigid ideologue.
I don’t expect you to try to encompass the whole range of views in a single post on social media, but it seemed quite dismissive to me
@neilk Pardon me, but I mentioned either end of a range, so I don't know what I'm dismissing.
unlike physical property, an "idea" is not something that is removed from the 'owner' when someone else 'takes' it, so the concept of intellectual property doesn't map to the normative understanding of the concept of 'theft'.
the 'loss' incurred is more systemic and based around potential outcomes instead of being a tangible and obvious first-order damage, which is hardly an intuitive and obvious concept for anyone to wrap their heads around.
I don't think there needs to be any attempt to justify any specific action to see that the concept of IP is one which is difficult to assign 'damages' to.
Which, again, isn't an intuitively obvious 'theft' - there's no physical object being removed from the prior owner's use, y'know?
@munin @corbden Is "wage theft" theft? Nothing in that act is removed, but instead deprived.
Suppose I'm an actor. Or game creator. Or musician. And say my creative output is used—without my consent and contrary to any licensing—to produce generative content that deprives me of future work opportunities and royalties. Am I wronged? Has something been taken from me in any sense?
@mttaggart to me it's about scale and profit motive, if I (or someone else) pirate a book or movie I will probably just enjoy or use it to improve myself, not try to scam the entire planet with my chatbot or something
@sharkfie That's kind of unsustainable at scale though, right? If everyone makes that same individual choice, seems like we have a fundamental breach of the agreement.
I get what you're saying, and I'm certainly not innocent of doing the same, but I think variations of "It's okay for me, but not for everyone" fall apart under scrutiny pretty quickly.
@mttaggart I did it more when I couldn't afford books and such. This isn't really a problem anymore, and I think most people buy things once they can afford it.
It's a small sample size, but I know other people who did the same when they were in college. AI companies will probably never pay unless courts make them.
@mttaggart I think it's the fact that it's not a physical object. The rationalization is that my use of it doesn't prevent others from using it. Most people fail to understand the amount of time and effort required to create the IP so they underestimate its value
@ithoughtisawa2 Except somehow the concept of violating a copyleft license is not a challenge!
It can be simultaneously true that intellectual property law/IP law is ridiculous and that stealing people's stuff is wrong! Those are not in conflict, and I don't really think "Well it's legal" is that rad of a defense.
the only real ip laws that will actively get you shit on if you break them are:
1) "give credit to other people if you use their work"
2) "don't pass other people's work off as your own".
3) "don't make money off other people's work without their consent"
and ai actively seeks to violate all three as blatantly as possible.
Anyway finally found inspiration for the next blog
@mttaggart If you ever want to chat about the economics of information let me know.
