Then let it be unjustified, and let it stay undone.
Copyright is a functionally perpetual state granted monopoly on information, on numbers. A business model that depends on such a delusion should not even exist to begin with.
Sorry, a piece of software is no more a bunch of numbers than a musical score or a novel. Intellectual property exists for valid reasons. It's clearly not delusional because we've made it work for hundreds of years.
Saying that intellectual property is founded on a delusion because someone can infringe on it or it's mere numbers is like saying your physical property rights are a delusion because the stuff is mere matter and can be manipulated by anyone. While true, such statements add absolutely nothing to the conversation. If people are willing to copy from others rather than make their own creations, there is value in the original works that is a direct result of someone's labor, not some immutable law of the universe.
It's not the age of printing presses anymore. It's the 21st century, the age of information, the age of globally networked pocket supercomputers. Copying is so trivial that it's become normal. It happens every day at massive scales. People do not even realize they are doing it.
We're discussing this in a thread about AI laundering of copyrighted works, for god's sake. If you keep believing this delusion, you'll eventually watch it shatter right before your eyes.
Let's not waste time comparing bits of infomation to physical objects either. We can revisit this discussion when Star Trek replicators are invented.
>It's the 21st century, the age of information, the age of globally networked pocket supercomputers. Copying is so trivial that it's become normal. It happens every day at massive scales. People do not even realize they are doing it.
This is a bunch of hand-waving. Information is still bought and sold, and protected by law. Dissemination by the Internet is not all that different from dissemination on paper or via radio waves. People who make illegal copies of media know what they are doing.
>We're discussing this in a thread about AI laundering of copyrighted works, for god's sake. If you keep believing this delusion, you'll eventually watch it shatter right before your eyes.
Again, the AI is doing something not all that different from what an intelligent human would do. The fact it is done by a machine is only marginally relevant, because we are getting into philosophical questions about how it works and so on. Even if AGI is achieved, I think copyright will be extended to include the output of the machines. But what might change is that the value of information goes down as it gets easier to produce.
>Let's not waste time comparing bits of infomation to physical objects either. We can revisit this discussion when Star Trek replicators are invented.
It's not a waste. Even in the case where replicators existed, the output of a replicator would cost something because energy is not free. I don't think it is free in Star Trek if memory serves me right. The replicator and the holodeck, being finite resources, must be allocated intelligently and fairly among the crew. Same for the physical space aboard the ship. If anyone was to be a pack rat with unlimited replicator access, they might flood an entire deck with trinkets.
Likewise, even though copying is easy, it still represents a theft from the producer of the information. We are only debating details of the mechanics of how it works, to decide whether AI actually copies enough to be infringing and what the damages might actually be. That is one big question. That's one line of questioning. The other is, can the output of an AI be copyrighted? I think the answer to that question is definitely yes.
