Explaining Copyright and AI Controversies
The problem with AI now, is that since it uses already known entities it has access to, this includes work that might not have permissions set for use. Items such as scholarly work, any original work, or even art may be compiled and accessed (without the knowledge of the owner as well), and be used to either complete a generation promt, or writing prompt.
The controversy lies in the fact that because of the fact that these are original works, and there is no permission given, nor proper credits given, that these AI-generated works are in violation of Copyright laws. The idea is that that information that was made originally is out on the Internet. It still must be credited properly in any way that it was used or accessed to come and form a new original work. The problem is that no permission was granted, and no credit is given through AI comiling all the information. It just examines, reads, then takes, and the prompter is openly using the information, still not knowing where it came from, and where the credit is due.
There are already numerous cases of this controversy appearing for generative AI battling artists. Gil Appel of Harvard Business Review explains, "In a case filed in late 2022, Andersen v. Stability AI et al., three artists formed a class to sue multiple generative AI platforms on the basis of the AI using their original works without license to train their AI in their styles, allowing users to generate works that may be insufficiently transformative from their existing, protected works," (Appel, 2023).
Here is another example of an existing court case regarding art/original work and AI tools infringement.
Addressing Copyright, Compensation Issues in Generative AI
You may also read more about the other case written about above here:
Generative AI Has an Intellectual Property Problem