> If I go to a bookshop, take a book off the shelf and start reading it, I am not infringing any copyright
Do pro-generative AI people have absolutely no argument besides this? If I had a dollar for every time I've heard it, I'd be rich by now. And it's not even close to being a good argument.
"
If you had so many dollars you would change your motto/
to say your account is 7 digits like you won the lotto/
buy vanilla ice and lick it like there's no tomorrow
"
In hip-hop culture these lyrics could jog someone's memory of some Nas lyrics, some 8 mile battle songs maybe.
Could an AI come up with those awful lyrics? It sure could if it knew the specific Nas lyrics, 8 mile battle lyrics, knew about the lotto and twist the rules, what a motto is and so on.
Would it infringe any copyright by knowing the lyrics to Nas songs, 8 mile battle songs? According to you, yes. But I disagree.
Why hypocrites? Because I think artists (and coders) are always inspired by someone else's work and add their own experience, context, personality on top to create new work. Yes, generative AI is doing it a massive scale and democratizing most of the creative process, but to me it's the same thing even if, technically, it may be very crude and basic.
> Do pro-generative AI people have absolutely no argument besides this?
They say it even though the standard response is: "When I buy a joint[1], I am breaking no laws. Does that make it legal for a corporation to purchase 200m tons of marijuana for profit?"
As far as legal concepts go, scale matters! Just because you are legally allowed to do something individually, does not automatically make it legal to do it for profit 200m times a month.
FCOL, before you even get to the scale argument, some things that are legal to do for free are not legal to do for profit.
Do pro-generative AI people have absolutely no argument besides this? If I had a dollar for every time I've heard it, I'd be rich by now. And it's not even close to being a good argument.