zlacker

When it comes to copyright infringement vs free use in US law there are certain requirements that have to be met, one of which is "transformativity"

This concept has specific technical meaning -

https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/fair-use-what-transf...

It seems obvious to me that to call model weights "lossy compression" is not only incorrect from a technical (software dev) point of view, but also from this legal perspective.

The weights serve a different purpose than the original works from which they are derived, and wouldn't/couldn't POSSIBLY exist were it not for the original work of the authors of the models.

It's bad practice to go around espousing strong and condemnatory opinions about topics you don't have a full grasp of. In this case, it's both the technical details and the legal system.

It makes you look like a fool and costs you your credibility amongst peers in future encounters.

>>popalc+(OP)
Model weights are a form of data compression. Have a look at variational autoencoders for example where this is made more explicit (its latent space is a compression).

Your arguments regarding "transformative work" is what the discussion is all about. Let's see where it lands with case law.

FWIW, my stance is copyrighted content should not be used in training without request.

>It's bad practice to go around espousing strong and condemnatory opinions about topics you don't have a full grasp of. In this case, it's both the technical details and the legal system. >It makes you look like a fool and costs you your credibility amongst peers in future encounters.

Agree, thank you for the feedback. My analogy was quite exaggerative.

>>popalc+(OP)
Afaik the currently best compression techniques use a neural network internally. So the distinction is perhaps not as clear as you might think.

>>popalc+(OP)
> It's bad practice to go around espousing strong and condemnatory opinions about topics you don't have a full grasp of.

I disagree, the internet wouldn't be half as full of knowledge as it is if it weren't for the loudly ignorant giving the experts somebody to correct.