Re: <nettime> The Copy Far "AI" license

[rhatto via nettime-l <nettime-l@lists.nettime.org>]

On Tue, Oct 03, 2023 at 11:47:00AM +0200, Javier de la Cueva wrote:
> On 23/09/2023 17:48, rhatto via nettime-l wrote:
> > Hello nettimers, this might be of interest:
> > 
> >    Copy Far "AI" - A license close to copyleft, but far from the so-called
> >    "Artificial Intelligences": https://copyfarai.itcouldbewor.se
> > 
> > ps: I'm not in the list (please Cc).
> 
> Thank you for your email. Unfortunately, I have doubts about the
> enforceability/validity of the license.

Thanks for raising these concerns.

> Basically, copyright is about forbidding 4 activities: to copy, to make a
> derivative copy (to transform the work), to publicly communicate (intangible
> works) and to distribute (tangible works).
> 
> Nonetheless any user may exercise one or more of the above activities if
> they fall under at least one of the following scenarios:
> 
> 1. They do have permission from the rightholder.
> 2. They are exercising a limit -also called exception- (European system) or
> they are exercising fair use (USA system).
> 3. The work is under public domain.
> 
> Thus, you may exercise one or several of the activities (copy, transform,
> publicly communicate, distribute) over the work if you either have consent,
> the law allows you to do so or the rights were terminated.
> 
> The Copy Far "AI" licence focuses on two uses that the rightholder does not
> allow in any case: 'procedures known as "machine learning" and stylometric
> analysis'.

Yes, for fully copyrighted works the rightsholder won't allow these two
uses, and mentioning them explicitly would be redundant.

But Copy Far "AI" is intended for the case where the rightsholder wants
to grant everyone all these four activities you mentioned above, except
for "machine learning" and "stylometric analysis".

Maybe copylefted works (including code) are granting too much, and being
vulnerable to activities that undermine the intentions behind someone
who's sharing their work with the public.

> But even though the rightholder does not allow those uses of their work, the
> uses may be allowed by the law. And the rightholder cannot oppose to what
> the law allows:
> 
> - In Japan those uses seem to be allowed by the law since 2018 [1].
> - In USA we do not know if courts are going to consider that those uses fall
> under fair use. There are several trials going on and they will give us an
> answer.
> - In Europe if Google has scraped all the internet, hosts a cache copy and
> this activity has not been considered an infringement, even though websites
> include the 'all rights reserved' motto, then again we will have to wait to
> read the opinion of the European Court of Justice.
> 
> So, although I consider the licence a good initiative, I have my doubts
> about its validity.

You seem to be right about what's at stake in the legal stage.

For an ethical/moral/political standpoint, though, this license might
still be useful, regardless of the "fair use" outcome or it's validity
in courts.

> [1] https://eare.eu/japan-amends-tdm-exception-copyright/
> 
> --
> Kind regards,
> Javier de la Cueva

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