On Monday, Taylor Lorenz posted a telling story about how Meta has been suppressing access to LGBTQ content across its platforms, labeling it as “sensitive content” or “sexually explicit.” Posts wi…
Training LLMs on copyright material isn’t illegal to begin with, just like how learning from a pirated book isn’t or having drugs in your system isn’t, only being in possession of these things is illegal.
GDPR violations are on the other hand - illegal. You’re right in principle, don’t get me wrong and I appreciate your healthy cynicism but in this particular case being slapped with a GDPR fine is actually not worth keeping the data of one user.
Training LLMs on copyright material isn’t illegal to begin with
Reproducing identifiable chunks of copyrighted content in the LLM’s output is copyright infringement, though, and that’s what training on copyrighted material leads to. Of course, that’s the other end of the process and it’s a tort, not a crime, so yeah, you make a good point that the company’s legal calculus could be different.
If you’re in the US, sure. If you’re in Europe you can compel them to completely delete everything as per the GDPR.
And I am sure a company that is now openly training their LLMs on copyrighted materials is going to totally comply with all of that…
One of these days people are going to learn “But it is against the law” doesn’t apply to the rich and powerful, law enforcement, or megacorporations.
Training LLMs on copyright material isn’t illegal to begin with, just like how learning from a pirated book isn’t or having drugs in your system isn’t, only being in possession of these things is illegal.
GDPR violations are on the other hand - illegal. You’re right in principle, don’t get me wrong and I appreciate your healthy cynicism but in this particular case being slapped with a GDPR fine is actually not worth keeping the data of one user.
Reproducing identifiable chunks of copyrighted content in the LLM’s output is copyright infringement, though, and that’s what training on copyrighted material leads to. Of course, that’s the other end of the process and it’s a tort, not a crime, so yeah, you make a good point that the company’s legal calculus could be different.