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Leading AI companies have a favorite phrase when it comes to describing where they get the data to train their models: They say it’s “publicly available” on the internet.
Why it matters: “Publicly available” can sound like the company has permission to use the information — but, in many ways, it’s more like the legal equivalent of “finders, keepers.”
“That phrase confuses people,” developer Ed Newton-Rex tells Axios. “It’s probably designed to confuse people.”
- Newton-Rex spent years building AI audio systems before resigning from Stability AI, citing concerns about generative systems built with copyrighted material.
- “Publicly available” doesn’t mean anyone has given permission for use in the training of an AI system, Newton-Rex notes.
- “Essentially all they are saying is, ‘We have not illegally hacked into a system,’ ” says Newton-Rex, who now runs Fairly Trained, an organization that certifies models built on either licensed or public domain data.
Zoom in: The term, perhaps by design, sounds like “public domain” — which refers to information that is no longer subject to copyright protection or otherwise made freely available.
- Lots of information is “publicly available” but subject to various protections, including copyright.
- Large collections of pirated content have been made “publicly available” without the permission or consent of the creators.
“Many of the ‘publicly available’ books they took were from websites known for pirated content,” Clarkson Law Firm partner Timothy K. Giordano tells Axios. “The receipt and subsequent commercial misuse of stolen property won’t play well before a jury.” (Clarkson has brought several suits against AI companies.)
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Authors, publishers, and copyright holders have brought a number of suits arguing that AI companies are engaging in massive copyright infringement, both in the training and operation of their products.
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Illustration: Sarah Grillo/Axios
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