Publishers demand to be paid for AI using their work

ChatGPT, Bard, and all AI tools are trained on existing work, and quote that work without the originators being paid or cited in most cases — and publishers say this can't continue.

After years of Machine Learning being trained on existing published works, AI tools like ChatGPT and Bard have suddenly become mainstream. Even in their claimed beta or early versions, AI tools are being integrated into Microsoft 365, Adobe Firefly, and more.

According to the Wall Street Journal, publishers have been investigating how their content has been used in training AI tools, and examining legal options. Citing sources familiar with the meetings, the newspaper says that publishing trade group News Media Alliance wants members to be paid.

"We have valuable content that's being used constantly to generate revenue for others off the backs of investments that we make," Danielle Coffey, of News Media Alliance told the publication, "that requires real human work, and that has to be compensated."

News Corp's CEO, Robert Thomson, said at a recent investor conference that the company has "started discussions with a certain party who shall remain nameless."

"Clearly, they are using proprietary content — there should be, obviously, some compensation for that," he continued.

AI tools search the internet for the basis of their responses to user requests, and the Wall Street Journal points out there is a "fair use" legal provision that might cover some of this.

"We've done a lot with fair use," said Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, the company that created ChatGPT. "[However, we're] willing to pay a lot for very high-quality data in certain domains [such as science]."

When Microsoft's implementation of AI returns a response, it includes links to the sources it used. Google's Bard, however, makes at most a text reference to a source, rather than links or citations.

Google Assistant vice president Sissie Hsiao told the Wall Street Journal that the company "is deeply committed in supporting a healthy and vibrant content ecosystem." When AI tools are integrated into search, Google "will be welcoming conversations with stakeholders."

Microsoft has already been making payments to publishers for use of material on MSN, but reportedly those do not cover AI. Microsoft has not commented.

Google has similar deals with firms including News Corp, for a service called Google News Showcase, but again the payments do not include AI use.

Separately, when Adobe announced its Firefly AI tool, the company said that it was planning to have payment systems for artists before the app comes out of beta.

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20 Comments

Dwaric

said about 1 year ago

Human artists also learn/train from other artists work. Should they also compensate all the artists whose work they have seen?
Just a thought.

AppleZulu

said about 1 year ago

Dwaric said:

Human artists also learn/train from other artists work. Should they also compensate all the artists whose work they have seen?
Just a thought.

In copyright infringement cases involving humans, the court determines if the alleged infringer was exposed to the prior work and then essentially assesses if the new work is creatively novel, or if it is simply derivative. The same process applies to AI.

If an AI system catalogs prior works and then simply regurgitates catalog content in a cut-and-paste collage, then it’s infringement. At least based on what I’ve seen of current AI, that’s all it’s capable of. There is no actual learning followed by a creative spark in those algorithms. It’s like looking at a painting by an artist whose influences are way too obvious, or listening to a band playing songs with arrangements and vocal affectations that are indistinguishable from anything else on this week’s charts.

Here, the onus is on the AI developers to prove how what they’re up to is not just derivative regurgitation that is nothing more than the sum of its parts.

foregoneconclusion

said about 1 year ago

Dwaric said:

Human artists also learn/train from other artists work. Should they also compensate all the artists whose work they have seen?
Just a thought.

The "learning/training" lingo is just marketing. AI programs don't function without access to every letter/pixel of gigantic databases full of writing and art. There's no thinking, just brute force. No access to database = no production of writing or art. It's not a parallel to how humans create despite all of the marketing smoke and mirrors from the tech companies. Fair use laws don't apply because those laws were created for human capabilities, not for computer programs.

retrogusto

said about 1 year ago

Influences are in most cases clearly evident in human artists’ work in all disciplines and at all levels of competence, if you know what to look for. As Picasso said, “good artists borrow, great artists steal.” Just look at his work, and then look at the work of Georges Braque and Julio Gonzalez, whose work Picasso “stole” in this sense. There’s no shortage of examples in music and other art forms too. At this point, the most sophisticated automated systems can create works that are at least as original as what most humans are coming up with (which is a low bar), but of course there are humans pulling the strings here, designing the algorithms and training them, so you still easily argue that it’s just a more complex and technology-intensive form of human creation.

foregoneconclusion

said about 1 year ago

AppleInsider said: AI tools search the internet for the basis of their responses to user requests, and the Wall Street Journal points out there is a "fair use" legal provision that might cover some of this.

"We've done a lot with fair use," said Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, the company that created ChatGPT. "[However, we're] willing to pay a lot for very high-quality data in certain domains [such as science]."

Fair use can't possibly apply here because the programs aren't capable of producing anything without the database. 100% of what they produce is entirely dependent on work that was created by human beings. The fact that 100% might be made up of 1% of the material from 100 different human beings doesn't matter. Look at Adobe: they've already admitted that "AI" producing art based on their stock library requires compensation to the artists that they license stock art/photos from.