“Congress must now act to codify and clarify that AI training on public data is a fair use of textbooks.”
Last week, a coalition of entertainment companies filed a lawsuit against Midjourney, an AI company that uses publicly available data to build generation tools. These lawsuits follow similar actions against other major AI companies. The strategy is clear. Under the avalanche of litigation, AI startups can challenge established business models. If established media wins this battle, it won’t just hurt AI companies. Since the Internet itself, it will harm millions of American businesses and consumers who exist to benefit from the most transformative technology.
The question of this debate is the legal principle of fair use and a unique American doctrine that has made almost every major leap in modern technology innovation. Fair use allows search engines to index the web. This allows you to forward emails and quote texts in news articles. Protect your VCR, DVR, cloud computing, search and social media. These technologies do not exist because we use them today without fair use.
I’ve seen this movie before. In 1984, the entertainment industry fought to ban VCRs and claimed it would destroy the film. The Supreme Court opposed it and laid the foundation for the home video market. The industry generated around $24 billion a year, saving Hollywood from stagnation. What technology legacy media tried to kill has become one of the most profitable business lines.
At the time, the new tech skeptic was wrong. They are now devastatingly wrong.
AI models, like people, learn from the world around them. Publicly available text, images and videos training is not a flaw. This is the engine of AI innovation. I agree with the law. The U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California confirmed this week that a large-scale language model will produce “typical, transformative” content. If they start banning learning, they’re strangled the future of AI.
Worse, we make it difficult for AI innovators to thrive and grow in the United States. While the United States is bored in court, our geopolitical rivals are moving forward at a fierce pace. China has made AI a national order and has put billions of people into research and deployment. The EU is building an aggressive regulatory framework designed to enable national champions, even if they are incompletely done. Here in the US, copyright lawsuits allow the first to narrow down the most promising innovators.
Copyright If you rewrite fair use to ban AI training on Maximalists, you’re disarming yourself in the 21st century technology race. Worse, we pass the key to the next industrial revolution to the authoritarian regime without such hesitation.
Let’s be clear. These lawsuits are not about protecting artists. They are about hijacking our legal system to protect our legacy business models.
AI does not replace creativity, it amplifies it. Photoshop did not rule out photographers. Garage bands have not restricted musicians and have opened the door to new artists. AI does what these tools do for visual art and music for storytelling. Expand access, improve quality and lower entry barriers.
Hollywood has options. Legacy Studios can partner with Technologists to reinvent entertainment in the AI
Congress must now act to codify and clarify that AI training on public data is a fair use of textbooks. This will halt weaponized litigation designed to block innovation and make American AI leadership an unnegotiable strategic prioritization. If the US gives away our AI lead now, we may never get it back. This is an issue of innovation. National security issue. The future issue of the economy. Hollywood has already lost this battle once and is just lucky – and rich. This time, they can’t afford to beat them.
Image Source: Deposit photo
Author: GarageStock
Image ID: 133247770
