[kianlocke]

> I think it's only fair to pay for using someone else's work to your own benefit.

How many artists do you know that pay out a portion of the proceeds of any of their works to the artists that have influenced and inspired them?

Why should we have a separate set of laws for men and machines?

Why would we assume that any algorithms used to determine 'inspirational ancestry' will only ever be used against machines?

This is a power grab, pure and simple, an attempt to add style to the list of copyrightable immaterials -- Disney 2.0, but on a much more massive and debilitating scale.

[comfysocks]

Musicians that create original beats using samples of other artists music often owe royalties.

I think this is a better analogy. If a generative AI model was trained on vague memories of its inspirations, the output would suck. You only get impressive output when you use high quality exact copy training data.

Do you know any artists that can generate an exact copy of “girl with a pearl earring” or any other masterpiece you can name?

[kianlocke]

A sample is using a literal cut-and-paste of a section of another copyrighted work and re-selling it directly -- on the other hand, musicians that wholesale take a particular beat or rhythm section, but remake it using their own instruments, do not in fact owe any royalties at all. Rhythm is notoriously un-copyrightable (only melody).

As for artists that can generate an exact copy -- down to the brushstrokes -- there are in fact a number of them. We call them art forgers - generally, this is for works no longer in copyright, so the issue is the fraudulent claim of them being by another artist, rather than the reproduction of the work.

However, for the purposes of this discussion, I'd like to remind you that we are not talking about exact reproductions -- merely new works in a similar style.

[hn_acker]

> A sample is using a literal cut-and-paste of a section of another copyrighted work and re-selling it directly

"re-selling it directly" is not the usual case. The sample is just the extracted piece, while the practice called sampling is incorporating the piece into a new work [1]:

> In sound and music, sampling is the reuse of a portion (or sample) of a sound recording in another recording.

For example, hip hop is a genre which grew around sampling [1].

Sampling isn't necessarily fair use, but can be [1]. Reselling an extracted piece of a song almost certainly isn't fair use.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sampling_(music)

[kianlocke]

Sorry, I meant using directly in a work that is then resold. Thank you for clarifying, though.

[mvdtnz]

In my view it's just categorically wrong to treat a billion dollar computer system owned by a huge tech company the same way we treat the human brain. They are simply not the same thing.

[kianlocke]

In my view it's categorically wrong to assume that these systems will cost a billion dollars forever, and if we write the laws without that understanding, we are only helping billion-dollar corporations.

In cases where these systems were trained on data that was literally stolen from closed, user-gated sites, this is one thing -- for those trained on data that was pulled from the open web, there are a number of cases relating to scraping sites that publicly make available information, and they tend to fall in favor of the scraper (see LinkedIn for a prime example).

[mvdtnz]

Whether the system cost a billion dollars or not isn't the point. The point is that computer programs are categorically different to human brains because of the scale and perfect reproducibility.

[mistrial9]

"power grab" by artists to defend their works.. so unhinged, hard to respond.

OK - in the spirit of YNews.. there is a band of ambient, slow style musicians on Seattle radio KEXP live studio.. called "SlowDive" .. it appears to be four adult humans. Those people own equipment and to some extent, do tours.

For thousands of years literally, this "make music and tour" activity is part of human society. This particular "Slow Dive" band does ambient with some emotional lyrics on some songs.. basically it fits exactly what critics here call "copying other influences" .. yet, how do these four adult humans live a life in the modern West ? (might be UK-based) they have to pay bills, the time they tour or make music is "opportunity costs" per Chicago economics.

What is the emotional-psychological-economic driver to loudly and repeatedly deny the efforts of these four humans to make a living with their own "slightly unique" music style? Why is it not only OK, but cheered on here, to steal their copyright creative material to "train" computers to produce very similar material, at scale and at low cost?

I see a bitter side of non-artists, business people or just money lender types, who see an opportunity to financially benefit by buying stock in companies that steal from artists, combined with some kind of "oh grow up - no one values your precious artwork" attitudes..

[kianlocke]

> "power grab" by artists to defend their works.. so unhinged, hard to respond.

In what way is attempting to extend copyright from individual works to styles or sub-styles of art not a power grab? There is currently no concept of copyright that applies to style.

How is this 'defending their works' -- and not fencing off the entire space of art when they have merely staked off a few points within?

Also... Unhinged? Name-calling is not exactly in the spirit of hacker news, but to address the substance of your point -- SlowDive appears to be making music in the style of their predecessors (according to you). Should they be forced to pay them royalties because they heard their works on the radio, or maybe from a bootleg copy from a friend, or at a dive bar they paid no admission to, and then made music in the same or a substantially-similar style?

And if it is different enough not to be called the same style -- what determines the boundaries of a style in this completely novel and untested copyright regime?

> What is the emotional-psychological-economic driver to loudly and repeatedly deny the efforts of these four humans to make a living

It is strange that you seem to think that anyone that says that just having heard these songs (and been significantly influenced by them) should not require payments for making similar works is an attempt to deny their efforts to make a living.

Also, who has stolen works that have played on the radio or are publicly available online for free? Now, in the case of several of these larger AI companies, they have in fact actively taken information that was not publicly available, and that is a different discussion.

If these AI systems merely purchased a CD of the music before using it for training, would this be considered sufficient for you? Why or why not?

> I see a bitter side of non-artists... combined with some kind of "oh grow up - no one values your precious artwork" attitudes

I see a common attempt at painting opposition to an unprecedented broadening of copyright with a broad-brush in these discussions -- I'm both an artist (writer and musician) and I don't hold the opinion (and have not expressed anywhere in the thread above) that you appear to be ascribing to me by proxy.

Am I not allowed to disagree with what I see to be an unprecedented redefinition of copyright without name-calling and dubious and negative assumptions about my intentions on this forum?

[Jackson__]

>Why would we assume that any algorithms used to determine 'inspirational ancestry' will only ever be used against machines?

This is exactly the conclusion I've internally come to in regards to this topic.

In my opinion, there exists no possible future in which such a system will not be abused to rent-seek from real artists. The least horrible one I could realistically see is maybe a "Everyone born before Year X is not included in this system." clause, which is still quite dystopian.

[allturtles]

> Why should we have a separate set of laws for men and machines?

We already do. Humans have many rights that machines do not. I should think this is obvious and desirable.

[kianlocke]

Sorry, I should have phrased that as "why should we have a separate set of laws for men and for men using machines?"

No artist is required to pay out to their influences, but an artist that uses a machine must or it is a grave injustice?

[pixl97]

Or more to the point "why should we have a separate set of laws for men and for corporations?"

I do feel a lot of these attempts to provide one set of rules for people and one set of rules for everything else will fail in the US due to "corporations are people too".

Unless of course corporations actually want these rules as it further entrenches their power.