Speaking in a purely personal capacity here. And I realise it's a niche query in the grand scheme of things. But as a former freelance contributor to titles owned by at least two of the publishers who have signed deals with Open AI and/or their competitors, I'm unaware of any attempt being made by either AI firms or publishers to ensure that only the "content" owned by the publisher will be used under these agreements, and/or to ensure freelance contributors are paid if and when their work is re-used for this purpose. While absence of information doesn't confirm anything, it would come as a bit of a surprise to find that both sides had taken the time and trouble to design suitable mechanisms to correctly identify freelance contributions and ensure they're not ingested during this process. Certainly, there is no indication as yet that publishers are going to pay freelances for such re-use. There is precedent here in the newspaper sector, with the attitude shown by the Newspaper Licensing Agency (a body established by newspaper publishers to collect reproduction royalties from the likes of libraries) to freelances, which, in essence, is: "So little of what we publish is freelance-generated that it is not economically viable for us to account for it properly, so what we'll do is take a percentage of our income and donate it to charity". Again, to stress, this is just guesswork on my part and I have no evidence to suggest this is what's happening: but I would be entirely unsurprised if the deals cut between publishers and AI companies have been built around a similar view, and will, in essence, deny freelance contributors any share of income from the deal, and not give those contributors an option to refuse to allow their work to be swallowed and digested by the LLM. So not only are these deals likely to prove self-defeating for the reasons you eloquently lay out, Mic, but in the process the rights and incomes of freelance contributors are presumably being further eroded as well. And this in an era where, I would wager, the proportion of media "content" being produced by freelances is increasing, thus making it less attractive or viable a prospect for a freelance to consider working for companies who have agreed deals with LLM developers.
Thanks for this Mic. Could be the lateness of the hour/old age & decrepitude, but I’m still struggling to keep up with AI, or even to know what it’s really about. Have difficulty preventing stories going into the same bin as Bitcoin or Y2K. Bad attitude, I know...
Speaking in a purely personal capacity here. And I realise it's a niche query in the grand scheme of things. But as a former freelance contributor to titles owned by at least two of the publishers who have signed deals with Open AI and/or their competitors, I'm unaware of any attempt being made by either AI firms or publishers to ensure that only the "content" owned by the publisher will be used under these agreements, and/or to ensure freelance contributors are paid if and when their work is re-used for this purpose. While absence of information doesn't confirm anything, it would come as a bit of a surprise to find that both sides had taken the time and trouble to design suitable mechanisms to correctly identify freelance contributions and ensure they're not ingested during this process. Certainly, there is no indication as yet that publishers are going to pay freelances for such re-use. There is precedent here in the newspaper sector, with the attitude shown by the Newspaper Licensing Agency (a body established by newspaper publishers to collect reproduction royalties from the likes of libraries) to freelances, which, in essence, is: "So little of what we publish is freelance-generated that it is not economically viable for us to account for it properly, so what we'll do is take a percentage of our income and donate it to charity". Again, to stress, this is just guesswork on my part and I have no evidence to suggest this is what's happening: but I would be entirely unsurprised if the deals cut between publishers and AI companies have been built around a similar view, and will, in essence, deny freelance contributors any share of income from the deal, and not give those contributors an option to refuse to allow their work to be swallowed and digested by the LLM. So not only are these deals likely to prove self-defeating for the reasons you eloquently lay out, Mic, but in the process the rights and incomes of freelance contributors are presumably being further eroded as well. And this in an era where, I would wager, the proportion of media "content" being produced by freelances is increasing, thus making it less attractive or viable a prospect for a freelance to consider working for companies who have agreed deals with LLM developers.
That’s a very good point and I suspect you’re right.
Thanks for this Mic. Could be the lateness of the hour/old age & decrepitude, but I’m still struggling to keep up with AI, or even to know what it’s really about. Have difficulty preventing stories going into the same bin as Bitcoin or Y2K. Bad attitude, I know...
Not at all. Seems like a good way of keeping your brain free from negative clutter.
Thanks for this Mic. Perfect timing. I’ve been asked to deliver a class on AI and media next month so I’ll be stealing some of this.
Permission to steal comes baked in with the subscription.