[throwawayIche9j]

Yes. That's not to say that something damaging wasn't done, but nothing was stolen. Stealing/theft requires deprivation of property. It's like receiving a normal nonlethal punch in the face and calling it murder. Murder requires someone dying.

> Theft [...] is the act of taking another person's property or services without that person's permission or consent with the intent to deprive the rightful owner of it. --- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stealing

[KPGv2]

My God, I can't believe chodes are still playing this "how many angels can you fit on the head of a pin" navel gazing semantic argument. Thirty years at least, it was all you saw on fin de ciecle Slashdot from anyone with a six-digit UID. No one cares about your hyper literalist meaning of "theft," that's not the goddamn point. Christ, this place looks like Reddit more and more.

This isn't a court of law. We don't have to talk like lawyers. If you replaced "theft" with "copyright infringement" in the comment you had such a problem with, what meaningfully changes besides we all have about five additional brain cells?

[visarga]

Even the case for copyright infringement is weak. LLMs are not copying machines, we already have copying machines at much lower price, almost zero, and perfect fidelity and much faster than generating it probabilistically. So it makes no economic sense to spend billions on training and inference to make a copier. In fact the value of LLMs is where they do not copy but apply knowledge a new situation.

[AnthonyMouse]

> If you replaced "theft" with "copyright infringement" in the comment you had such a problem with, what meaningfully changes besides we all have about five additional brain cells?

The obvious difference that copyright is subject to fair use and various other limitations that personal property isn't.

[2ndorderthought]

Ever hear of Aaron swartz?

[AnthonyMouse]

Aaron Swartz was charged under the CFAA, which isn't even copyright law, and the prosecution was widely condemned as draconian overreach.

[skeeter2020]

>> Stealing/theft requires deprivation of property

maybe you should look up the definition of property, which is a set of legally recognized rights over a thing, typically including:

* possession (what you're focusing on)

* use

* exclusion

* transfer

The last 3 seem like they have been breached, in legally that's theft.

[jasomill]

Violation of these rights may be criminal without meeting the strict legal definition of theft.

This can even extend to stealing physical property.

Depending on local laws, stealing a car may not actually be theft if the defendent can prove they intended to return it before the owner got home from work, though it would certainly be considered theft in the colloquial sense of the term, and they would still be guilty of a lesser offense like civil and/or criminal conversion.

[throwawayIche9j]

> Depending on local laws, stealing a car may not actually be theft if the defendent can prove they intended to return it before the owner got home from work

I doubt there's even one place where the law works like that.

[KPGv2]

> I doubt there's even one place where the law works like that.

In a lot of places, that's how it works. A key element of theft is the intent to permanently deprive someone of property.

This is why joyriding isn't classified as auto theft and is instead a lesser offense. It's because joyriding is an intent to temporarily deprive, while GTA is an intent to permanently deprive.

In some jxns (the UK is one), there is a tort called trespass to goods, and an example of this would be "stealing" someone's property to deliver to another location for them to use there. The tort of conversion is similar: interference with someone's property right to treat it as your own (silent as to length of time).

[2ndorderthought]

Yea in the us if someone tries to steal your car and you are in it or threatened by it you can shoot them dead or something like that (ianal) You may have a court day but in many situations no punishment will follow.

[throwawayIche9j]

Theft is not the breach of any property right. It's specifically the deprivation of property without consent. Yes, I have checked the definition in my jurisdiction.

Getting punched in the face also violates rights, yet isn't murder. Murder is specifically about dying.

[rustystump]

You forget that laws are made by people and at anytime they can change interpretations are arbitrary, roe vs wade today but not tomorrow.

People seem to think what ai is today is theft. If enough people agree, it will be theft. Big companies dont like this and push the other way. An objectiveness doesnt exist here. It is too wiggly

[odo1242]

You’re splitting hairs over a definition that isn’t relevant here (theft and copyright infringement are different things) to defend something that even you agree is bad.

[throwawayIche9j]

It isn't splitting hairs. The damages are completely different in nature.

With theft, the entire damage is the deprivation. It could be an heirloom or some other object that may have been entrusted to you, something that can never be replaced, memorabilia of loved ones. Something that you may have needed in your posession to survive (e.g. a car to go to your job).

With a given copyright violation, the damage is that maybe[1] you made less profit than you could have. The potential for profit is not property. Profit isn't guaranteed.

[1] The loss is not certain, because there's no guarantee that the ones consuming the copyrighted content could have even afforded it.