Show transcript
Screenshot of a tumblr post by hbmmaster:
the framing of generative ai as “theft” in popular discourse has really set us back so far like not only should we not consider copyright infringement theft we shouldn’t even consider generative ai copyright infringement
who do you think benefits from redefining “theft” to include “making something indirectly derivative of something created by someone else”? because I can assure you it’s not artists
okay I’m going to mute this post, I’ll just say,
if your gut reaction to this is that you think this is a pro-ai post, that you think “not theft” means “not bad”, I want you to think very carefully about what exactly “theft” is to you and what it is about ai that you consider “stealing”.
do you also consider other derivative works to be “stealing”? (fanfiction, youtube poops, gifsets) if not, why not? what’s the difference? because if the difference is actually just “well it’s fine when a person does it” then you really should try to find a better way to articulate the problems you have with ai than just saying it’s “stealing from artists”.
I dislike ai too, I’m probably on your side. I just want people to stop shooting themselves in the foot by making anti-ai arguments that have broader anti-art implications. I believe in you. you can come up with a better argument than just calling it “theft”.
My point of contention is that the arguments you're using are flawed, not your intentions. OpenAI, Meta, Disney, ect. are in the wrong because they pirate/freeboot and infringement on independent artist's licenses. It's not their use of technology or the derivative nature of the works it produces that are the problem: making AI the face of the issues moves the blame away from the companies, and allows them to continue to pirate/freeboot/plagiarize (or steal, as you define it) from artists.
Yes, part of my point is that capitalism is bad, but thats further up the chain than what I was arguing. My point is that copyright law and more importantly, its implementation and enforcement is broken. Basically all your issues originate not with AI but with the fact that independent artists have no recourse when their copyrights are violated. AI wouldn't be an issue if AI compananies actually paid artists for their work, and artists could sue companies who infringe on their rights. The problem is that artists are being exploited and have no recourse.
Using allegory to hopefully make my point a bit more clear: Imagine you have a shop of weavers (artists). The comapny running the shop brings in a loom (AI), and starts chaining their workers to it and claiming its an Automatic Weaver™ (pirating and violating artists rights). The problem isn't the loom, and blaming it shifts blame away from whoever it was that decided to enslave their workers. Trying to ban the loom doesn't prevent the shop from just chaining the workers to their desks, as was often done in the past, nor does it prevent them from bringing in Automatic Potters™. If you want to stop this, even ignoring the larger spectre of capitalism, it should be slavery that is outlawed (already done) and punished (not done), not the use of looms.
If you are trying to fix/stop the current state of AI and prevent artists from being exploited by massive companies in this way, banning AI will only slow it and will limit potentially useful technology (that artists should be paid for). Rather than tackle one of the end results of rhe problem, you need to target it closer to its root - the fact that large companies can freely pirate, freeboot, and plagiarize smaller artists.