Post #4082418

2026-07-24 10:27 UTC

@pluralistic@mamot.fr I have to say I disagree with you already. Perhaps this is my bias speaking, but it is hard for me not to classify a technology that relies on scraping the works of thousands of creative workers, many of whom are my colleagues, destroying websites and (as of recently) physical paper books in the process without a single care, as exceptionally wicked. Perhaps it is not exceptionally wicked solely because it makes living conditions (cost per kWh, noise, heat...) measurably worse near its factories, whether the residents of those places use the factory's products or not. Plenty of prior technologies have done that -- it's how "smog" became a word. But no prior technology has relied on destructively consuming human culture in order to sustain itself. https://www.404media.co/ai-companies-are-buying-tons-of-old-books-because-theyre-free-of-ai-slop/

Replies (3)

@joshbuddy@sfba.social 2026-07-24 11:56

@AVincentInSpace@furry.engineer @pluralistic@mamot.fr by that logic is the Internet Archive bad?

Open ##4082419
@phl@mastodon.social 2026-07-24 14:00

@AVincentInSpace@furry.engineer @pluralistic@mamot.fr That's not the technology being exceptional and exceptionally wicked, it's the hype and the bubble being exceptionally wicked.

Open ##4082421
@uis@pone.social 2026-07-25 13:51

@AVincentInSpace@furry.engineer @pluralistic@mamot.fr > a technology that relies on scraping the works of thousands of creative workers, Search engines now bad? Expanding copyright AKA publisher's dictatorship did not do anything good in last century. > destroying websites and physical books You mean how publishers end up burning books? Or how publishers make programmed destruction of culture with DRM? Which is same thing as burning books, just digital.

Open ##4267173