The news of a settlement in the Anthropic AI piracy and copyright case came just before I filed the last of last week’s columns. Since then, the dust has had a little chance to settle, and reflections are starting to emerge on what any potential settlement might mean. I found (as ever) Mark Williams’ very detailed analysis highly thought-provoking.
ALLi News Editor Dan Holloway
Williams looks at the implications for all parts of the literary world, including readers and writers. His main headline point is that a settlement might not be in rights holders’ long-term interests.
Why a Settlement May Undermine Rights Holders
First and foremost, he sees this as a consequence of any out-of-court settlement stripping all parties of the ability to create a precedent in court. In this case, that means the fair use ruling will not be challenged. All that will matter is how books used for training were obtained.
And the possible upshot of that is that any attempt to negotiate licensing rights will be undermined: all tech companies will need to do is purchase a single copy of a book at retail price, and they can then use it in their models.
Age Verification and Decentralized Platforms
Another interesting story from the tech world to round things out. First, age verification is a hot topic right now. The UK required sites where users might come across “harmful but legal” content to verify users’ ages or face large fines at the end of July. And some states in the US are doing likewise.
This obviously has the potential to impact many of us as creators as well as readers. Last week one of the big difficulties at the heart of these laws was under the spotlight. Mastodon, the decentralized social media platform, announced that it didn’t have the resources to comply with state laws on age verification. Mastodon’s decentralized nature means it doesn’t have a single server but runs on many different servers in many different locations.
Responsibility for enforcing centralized rules in decentralized spaces is an issue that is obviously knotty but one that hasn’t received the attention it possibly deserves.
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