I’m
going
to
draw
you
like
one
of
my
French
humans.
Unless
you’ve
been
living
under
a
law
library,
it
would
be
hard
to
not
take
note
of
the
rapid
influx
of
AI
art.
Face
modifying
apps,
extended
shots
of
events
and
people
that
never
happened
that
uncanny
only
begins
to
explain
their
weirdness,
you
name
it.
The
figure
of
AI
as
artist
has
arrived,
but
is
any
of
it
legal?
A
small
group
of
artists
aim
to
find
out.
From
Reuters:
A
group
of
visual
artists
has
sued
artificial
intelligence
companies
for
copyright
infringement,
adding
to
a
fast-emerging
line
of
intellectual
property
disputes
over
AI-generated
work.Stability
AI’s
Stable
Diffusion
software
copies
billions
of
copyrighted
images
to
enable
Midjourney
and
DeviantArt’s
AI
to
create
images
in
those
artists’
styles
without
permission,
according
to
the
proposed
class-action lawsuit filed
Friday
in
San
Francisco
federal
court.The
artists’
lawyers,
the
Joseph
Saveri
Law
Firm
and
Matthew
Butterick,
filed
a
separate
proposed
class
action
lawsuit
in
November
against
Microsoft’s
GitHub
Inc
and
its
business
partner
OpenAI
Inc
for
allegedly
scraping
copyrighted
source
code
without
permission
to
train
AI
systems.
I’m
gonna
flag
it
for
you
in
case
your
eyes
glossed
over
it.
The
word
there
is
billions.
Billons.
With
a
B.
Even
if
the
individual
damages
are
pennies
on
the
dollar,
the
aggregate
of
those
alleged
copyright
infringements
would
be…
well,
I’m
not
that
good
at
math,
but
it
would
put
a
sizeable
dent
in
my
student
loan
principal.
Before
I
get
in
to
what
people
think
about
this,
I’d
like
to
turn
the
mic
over
to
an
AI
program
to
get
its
thoughts
on
the
points
of
contention
in
this
legal
matter.
Damn…
that
was
pretty
good.
There
may
actually
be
some
teeth
to
the
claim
that
tech’s
algorithmic
reasoning
could
at
some
point
give
Supreme
Court
justices
a
run
for
their
money.
Until
then,
let’s
get
back
to
a
more
human
perspective.
This
is
going
to
be
big.
Not
because
AI
art
has
and
continues
to
screw
over
thousands
of
small,
independent
creators.
That’s
just
a
part
of
business.
Big
names
are
being
impacted.
Really
big
names.
Getty
Images
also announced Tuesday
that
it
had
initiated
legal
proceedings
against
Stability
AI
in
the
United
Kingdom
over
Stability’s
alleged
copying
of
millions
of
its
images.Stability
AI
“chose
to
ignore
viable
licensing
options
and
long‑standing
legal
protections
in
pursuit
of
their
stand‑alone
commercial
interests,”
Getty
Images
said
in
a
statement.
For
those
not
in
the
know,
if
you’ve
ever
seen
a
stock
image,
every
one
you’ve
seen
is
probably
from
Getty.
The
thing
that
cracks
me
up
about
a
lawsuit
of
this
magnitude
is
that
it
started
with
monkeying
around.
I
mean
this
literally
—
the
issue
around
the
legal
status
of
images
created
by
non-humans
got
a
lot
of
attention
after
a
macaque
named
Naruto
took
a
selfie.
If
you’d
like
to
follow
the
case
—
of
course
you’d
like
to
follow
the
case
—
here’s
the
citation:
Andersen
v.
Stability
AI
Ltd,
U.S.
District
Court
for
the
Northern
District
of
California,
No.
3:23-cv-00201.
Lawsuits
Accuse
AI
Content
Creators
Of
Misusing
Copyrighted
Work
[Reuters]
Chris
Williams
became
a
social
media
manager
and
assistant
editor
for
Above
the
Law
in
June
2021.
Prior
to
joining
the
staff,
he
moonlighted
as
a
minor
Memelord™
in
the
Facebook
group Law
School
Memes
for
Edgy
T14s.
He
endured
Missouri
long
enough
to
graduate
from
Washington
University
in
St.
Louis
School
of
Law.
He
is
a
former
boatbuilder
who
cannot
swim, a
published
author
on
critical
race
theory,
philosophy,
and
humor,
and
has
a
love
for
cycling
that
occasionally
annoys
his
peers.
You
can
reach
him
by
email
at cwilliams@abovethelaw.com and
by
tweet
at @WritesForRent.
