• Disney and NBCUniversal have teamed up to sue Midjourney.
  • The companies allege that the platform used its copyright protected material to train its model and that users can generate content that infringes on Disney and Universal’s copyrighted material.
  • The scathing lawsuit requests that Midjourney be made to pay up for the damage it has caused the two companies.
  • rottingleaf@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    1
    ·
    2 days ago

    I would personally argue that fixing the law means getting rid of the notion of intellectual property all together.

    Perhaps now - yes. 20 years ago one could argue, but today in practice it, as it was intended, simply already doesn’t exist. Those holding the IP are those having enough power to insert themselves in a right place. The initial purpose is just not achievable.

    In my own reasoning someone copying me is the highest form of flattery and i would still have an edge understanding the properties of own idea better then the copycat does.

    Yes, if the artist thinks that. And no, if the artist expects to make some money from every copy.

    Its a huge limiter on human progress and absolutely non sensical in situations where multiple people just happen to have a similar idea.

    That’s true for patents and technologies, but not true for art and software, where it’s improbable to just come up with the same thing.

    Naturally such idea of abolishing copyright receives lots of criticism from many people because we would have to solve other problems that copyright now aims to fix but i don’t think that justifies the damage it does.

    Now - maybe. There are a few traditional ways, like authors reading aloud pieces of their creations and people buying tickets to such performances, same with music. And models with paying forward for a request, like crowdfunding or an order.

    But personally I still think some form of it should exist. Maybe non-transferable to companies and other people other than via inheritance. Intellectual work is work, and people do it to get paid. It’s just not good enough if the returns don’t scale with popularity.