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by ninjagoo 132 days ago
That is a good question. However, copyright exists (for a limited time) to allow for them to be compensated. AI doesn't change that. It feels like blocking AI-use is a ploy to extract additional revenue. If their content is regurgitated within copyright terms, yes, they should be compensated.
1 comments
fc417fc802 132 days ago
The problem is that producing a mix of personalized content that doesn't appear (at least on its face) to violate copyright still completely destroys their business model. So either copyright law needs to be updated or their business model does.

Either way I'm fairly certain that blocking AI agent access isn't a viable long term solution.

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ninjagoo 132 days ago
> Either way I'm fairly certain that blocking AI agent access isn't a viable long term solution.

Great point. If my personal AI assistant cannot find your product/website/content, it effectively may no longer exist! For me. Ain't nobody got the time to go searching that stuff up and sifting through the AI slop. The pendulum may even swing the other way and the publishers may need to start paying me (or whoever my gatekeeper is) for access to my space...

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zeagle 131 days ago
That’s a perspective I hadn’t considered. Although the whole thing stinks of middlemen extracting all the profit between producers and consumers e.g. ag sector by the laws won’t catch up or even force integration. Thanks!
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ninjagoo 131 days ago
There is definitely a middleman question.

The bigger question is business model vs value-add. Copyright law draws a very direct line from value-add to compensation - if you created something new (or even derivative), copyright attaches to allow for compensation, if people find it valuable.

Business models are a different animal: they can range from value-add services and products to rent-seeking to monopolies, extracting value from both producers and consumers.

While copyright law makes no mention of business models, I don't know whether that is a historical artifact since copyright is presumably older, or a philosophical exclusion because society owes no business model a right to exist. I would suggest the existence of monopoly-busting government agencies argues that societies do not owe business models a right of existence. Fair compensation for the advancement of arts and sciences is clearly a public good, though.

Tying it back to the AI-in-the-middle question, it's yet another platform in a series of these between producers and consumers, and doesn't override copyright. Regurgitating a copyright (article, art, whatever) should absolutely attract compensation; should summarizing content attract compensation? should it be considered any different from a friend (or executive assistant) describing the content? And if the producers' business model involves extracting value from a transaction on any basis other than adding value to the consumer, does society owe that business model any right to exist?

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