Recently unsealed court filings in the New York Times’ lawsuit against OpenAI and Microsoft have surfaced evidence that tech giants were aware of the severe impact their operations would have on online content ecosystems. Internal documents indicate that executives at both companies anticipated a “doom loop” that would significantly harm the integrity of the web.
The records, which characterize the extensive scraping of copyrighted material used to train artificial intelligence models as the “largest theft of labor in human history,” also suggest that the firms believed their actions undermined the concept of fair use entirely.
Many of the most striking quotations originate from Brent Hecht, Microsoft’s Director of Applied Science. However, Microsoft has sought to separate itself from these statements. Alex Haurek, a company spokesperson, told The Verge that the comments reflected only…
I am surprised by the level of internal awareness shown here. It really wasn’t an accident after all.
Does this doom loop just mean the web becomes a feedback circle of AI-generated spam? That sounds even worse.
Wait, so Microsoft is distancing itself from Brent Hecht? That seems like classic corporate deflection. Anyone else notice that?
The ‘largest theft of labor’ quote is chilling. It really does feel like they are dismantling the internet’s foundation.
Talk about hypocrisy. They knew exactly what they were doing and did it anyway for profit.